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- [WIU] Weekly Incubator Update…
[WIU] Weekly Incubator Update: 2017, Week 32.
Note: Data retrieved on 2017/08/13 at 06:12 (UTC).
I. Phase 1 Courses
I.A. Transfers
- Exits (Courses reaching BETA Phase): None.
- Entries (Courses entering the Incubator): None.
I.B. Completion Summary
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(A) This week's value automatically generated from Duolingo's statistics.
(S) This week's value self-reported by the team of volunteers working on the course.
II. Latest News from Course Volunteers (All Phases)
Course "Klingon from English" (Phase 1)
By mizinamo on 2017/08/11 (full text here)
Status update, 11 August 2017
We're putting the finishing touches on this version of the course now. A handful of skills that w...
Course "Korean from English" (Phase 1)
By Soedori on 2017/08/09
The Korean course is finished
You've heard it you boys. We've finished. Just need to add alternate answers now. Thank you all for your support
100% completion
Course "English from Tamil" (Phase 1)
By goosefield on 2017/08/05 (full text here)
Hello! | வணக்கம்!
Hello! I am goosefield. I’m a new member of the English for Tamil team. My native languages are T...
III. Previous Weekly Incubator Updates
See this index of WIUs.
42 Comments
206
Us boys? OK...
Thanks for the update, as always, jrikhal! It's particularly nice to see Russian from Spanish advancing every week.
206
Not of the date the course escaped, but I've got my flight confirmations in my email and was only up at such a horrendous hour to get ready for my flight (and extend my streak while cleaning my teeth...).
The Klingon update is both scary and exciting. Exciting because it's looking like it will be out pretty soon, and scary because of the mistakes the technical issues could allow. Yes, please, let us not blow up the star ship through miscommunication!
I also honestly hope Czech and Korean will be out around the release dates. Maybe a little before.... I'm very excited because I would love to learn both.
2208
I think their plan is to get it out at the same time as Star Trek Discovery, the new show.
Congratulations to the Korean from English team! I'm excitedly awaiting the new launches, but I also have to say... I'd love to see some new courses in the incubator. Selfish me wants more for English (or French) speakers, although having some for speakers of other languages has to be a priority.
In the meantime, I've told myself that I can't start a new course until I finish one of the ones that's already on my plate, which makes the waiting a bit easier.
I do believe we'll be seeing some more courses for English speakers shortly. Thai has graduated, and they are currently working on Chinese. Once Klingon, Czech and Korean graduate, we will have two courses left in the incubator (not counting Japanese and Korean, only releasing on mobile) for English speakers, which (I'm not sure of this) may be the lowest we've ever had. (Wouldn't know, but it's certainly low.) Duo might want to fix that.
Like Roman said, that leaves four. But even the current seven is basically the lowest ever. The first six courses were all added in a 24 hour period, 5 days later Irish made it seven and we haven't gone below that ever since.
I'm not as confident that we'll see new courses added. Jrikhal has pointed out several times that there is no evidence of "one out, one in" policy and seven months ago Luis said language addition is not a priority. We can hope that their priorities have changed but the lack of any new additions in the last five months indicates otherwise. Then again, that has to change eventually.
But that very comment has proven to be a horrible predictor of whether Japanese for English speakers would be added (and a Mandarin teaching expert needed at Duo) in our lifetimes. Whatever the reason for the low predictive value, my cynicism trumps my pessimism. They will do what they want when they want, no matter what they say or hint they will or won't do. (ETA: I welcome the possibility of latent Finnship with gratitude. Been called much worse...)
True, but they have wanted to be somewhat secretive about those languages even after they have started developing/preparing them (compare Klingon to Japanese, for example. The Klingon post is pretty much exactly two years older, btw) so it's possible he just wanted to curb our enthusiasm. That AMA was 10 days before Japanese was added. I would be surprised if he didn't know what was about to happen.
What that comment has been an excellent predictor of, is the lack of courses: four courses in the last seven months (Japanese and Haitian within 10 days of the AMA), none in the last five. Clearly it isn't a priority.
206
I was looking for a suitable Finnish Nightmares comic for this, but pessimism/cynicism (I think nueby might be an undercover Finn, and possibly not aware of it yet) is not really the aspect of our culture covered there.
413
The apostrophe is also a letter in Ukrainian and Guaraní. I wonder if it's treated differently in those courses than others. I also wonder how this plays out for the people in countries without an apostrophe on the standard keyboard, who often substitute a single quote.
PS: it looks like the dates for the listing of prior WIUs have gotten off by a week of late.
Have a look at the incubator:
- Czech - https://incubator.duolingo.com/courses/cs/en/status (21st August 2017)
- Korean - https://incubator.duolingo.com/courses/ko/en/status (7th September 2017) - Mobile release only.
- I know you didn't ask but I thought I'd put Klingon here anyway - https://incubator.duolingo.com/courses/tlh/en/status - 15th September 2017)