Rosetta Stone

[Setra]

I've been thinking about trying to learn a new language or two and I have seen the commercials/infomercials for this product... Anyone know much about it? I don't trust commercials (obviously) but one of the guys I work with says it was pretty good.

But I won't just go off of one review either.

[Mando Knight]

Well, it is an expensive program that is supposedly used by government agencies for training secret agents and such...

Unless you've been seeing commercials for the chunk of rock that let linguists decipher Egyptian script...

[Groundhog]

My friend's mom uses it, and absolutely loves it, if that's any help. What I heard from her about it is that it breaks the language up into a lot of small lessons, so that you can do a lot or a little at once.

[Setra]

Well, it is an expensive program that is supposedly used by government agencies for training secret agents and such...

Unless you've been seeing commercials for the chunk of rock that let linguists decipher Egyptian script...
Yeah I figured given the price it should do SOMETHING... the commercial says it's used by government agencies but "Truth in Advertising" be damned, I won't believe it just because a commercial says it. They could probably say it if just one Government guy bought it or something...

My friend's mom uses it, and absolutely loves it, if that's any help. What I heard from her about it is that it breaks the language up into a lot of small lessons, so that you can do a lot or a little at once.
Well more good reviews certainly help, and the fact it breaks the lessons up is kinda nice to know too.

[RTGoodman]

Well, it is an expensive program that is supposedly used by government agencies for training secret agents and such...

Yep, my dad's military and at least a couple of his bosses have used it to learn Farsi and Arabic and stuff. I personally can't attest to how good it is, but a lot of people seem to like it.

[Cristo Meyers]

It does what it does and does it well.

Problem: it is very expensive, in the $300 range.

[Setra]

It does what it does and does it well.

Problem: it is very expensive, in the $300 range.
I'd imagine it's cheaper than taking classes.

I think I'll give it a shot.

[Cristo Meyers]

Probably, maybe more effective too. I know the price point threw me when I looked into them.

Side note, this:


I ship Pyramid Head/Alma.

...made my freakin' head explode in terror, and that's hard to do to me. Congratulations.

*starts piecing head fragments back together*

[Winter_Wolf]

One of my friends used it for a while. He said it was pretty good. I don't know if he kept using it after he started grad school for Japanese, but he thought it was worth the money. (I should point out that he spoke pretty fluent Japanese before and he was using Rosetta to brush up, but still, I trust his judgment about things.)

My wife uses Rosetta to study English. She doesn't keep at it daily, but it has helped her a lot, and it's really helped her pronunciation a lot.

If you can justify the cost of the program to yourself, I'd say it's worth it if you can stick with it. If you're going to do it in anything resembling a half-ass kind of way (I've been known to do things like that) you probably should save your money.

[Mephibosheth]

I don't have any experience with Rosetta Stone, but if you're looking for a cheaper alternative and can be relatively disciplined about it, I've had good experiences with Teach Yourself (http://www.teachyourself.co.uk/language.htm). We actually used the Teach Yourself book as the text book for the 1st and 2nd semesters of Hindi at the university I attended, and it was a pretty good system. Each book comes with a CD of conversations and dialogues, which is helpful. Then again, all you get are a book and a CD so it's only really good if you're really disciplined, interesting mostly in learning to read, or have some outside assistance (others learning at the same time, a native/proficient speaker who can help you, etc).

Hope that helps.

Mephibosheth