Comment by yieldcrv
there is an underserved audience that wants an engaging way to learn a language and are disillusioned with Duolingo already
Duolingo is for people that will never travel for more than a weekend once every other year, and its fine that its entertaining for them or their last minute crash course to feel less ignorant. Lately I've seen it used by people that want to feel closer to their roots.
But I don't think people actually engaging with other cultures and going abroad to do so are still using this. On the other hand, LLM's are really good at slang and colloquialisms, something neither Duolingo or an in person teacher will reveal to you.
> there is an underserved audience that wants an engaging way to learn a language and are disillusioned with Duolingo already
I'm just very unsure whether it's possible to design an effective language learning program that is "engaging" in the way that Duolingo users want it. At the end of the day, you should feel engagement from using the language (and seeing yourself improve) and not from external gimmicks.