Consumer
Knowledge
Knowledge
Livemocha defines itself as "the world's largest online language learning community." It has the following to say about itself.
"Livemocha is the world’s largest online language learning community, offering free and paid online language courses in 35 languages to more than 6 million members from over 200 countries around the world.
Global interest in language learning is exploding. Trade, immigration and travel are conducted across countries and continents like never before in human history. The result is a powerful desire shared by people around the world to communicate with one another and understand different cultures. Not surprisingly, the size of the language learning market is estimated at a staggering $50 billion USD.
In a world hungry for new language skills, and increasing broadband Internet access and VOIP adoption, our mission is to provide a more accessible, affordable, and engaging way to learn a language. Livemocha allows people around the world to help each other with language learning, and provides our community with opportunities to learn and practice new languages together."
As a serving member of the U.S. Army, I have access to Rosetta Stone Language courses for free, and I can attest to the fact that Rosetta Stone's famous engine is not nearly as powerful or educational as Livemocha's tool. I'm unsure if the free version offered to soldiers is different than the paid version, but Rosetta Stone merely consists of listening to phrases and matching the phrases with the pictures over and over and over. If I did not have a working knowledge of French before Rosetta Stone, I would have had a very difficult time learning anything from it. Having said that, the program was useful for brushing up on old terms.
Livemocha, however, has none of these limitations, even in its free version. It contains the opportunity to practice and study vocabulary terms, which is an important part of learning (and one that Rosetta Stone entirely lacked). I have not checked out the paid version of Livemocha, either, but the free version has contained enough information to keep me occupied for months so far.
Livemocha is a combination learning and social networking site, and it allows you to create a profile as well as choose your learning opportunities. The free version allows you to access sample portions of the paid courses to see what it offers. Paid courses cost $14.95 and are similar to, say, half a semester's worth of French class. There are various level's, and the sites best services are in five common languages (English, Spanish, French, Italian, and German), but the site is an excellent tool, even as a free service.
I have used Live Mocha and highly recommend it. It is an excellent way to learn a new language. I have also used Rosetta Stone and Live Mocha has really built on this system and by building in the chance to speak to native speakers who can help each other this has really made a tremendous and powerful language learning system.
Seems as if Rosetta Stone is not doing enough marketing about their TOTALe courses which offer all those features you are missing in the classic version. Of course, the price difference is quite obvious but then there is the success team that supports you along the way and the sessions with professional language coaches.
And there is always the opportunity to join the free Rosetta World http://rworld.com which also no one seems to know about.
Livemocha seems really to be more forward about their features so really interesting to read your post!
This is really a nice blog. I can not aggree with you more
This is really a nice blog. I can not aggree with you more.
this is really good job for the world peoples.by live mocha. so i can say it will be very useful in the coming future. thanks to live mocha.
I'm a member of Livemocha and enjoy it. It is time consuming but then learning a new language is learning a skill and skills are learned through practice.