Interview
Tech Background: Babbel Speech Recognition
Interview with Technical Director Thomas Holl Speech recognition is the exciting new feature at Babbel. It’s not only fun – it’s also amazingly efficient for learning a new language. But how does it work? I got the low down from our Technical Director Thomas. Crisi: What does the new speech recognition tool do? Thomas: [...]
Brad Pitt (as Lt. Aldo Raine) Scores 57 in Italian
After we released the new speech recognition feature yesterday and had all the good feeedback, we got into what you might call a funny mood. We ended up testing some celebrities with our new feature. It was loads of fun running Brad Pitt’s pronunciation through the tool to see what score he would have gotten [...]
Get Started with Spanish
Beginners in Spanish can finally say gracias. There is now a full, Online Course on Babbel.com that will teach you all the basics you need to get by anywhere in the Spanish-speaking world, from Barcelona to Santiago to downtown Los Angeles. Developed from proven print materials and adapted for the internet with Babbel.com’s consistent focus [...]
“Highly Commended” by TechCrunch
After being selected in the short lists in two categories for the TechCrunch Europas awards, Babbel was “highly commended” in the category “Best Design”. We’re very proud, especially because we didn’t ever think of Babbel as eye candy. Instead, we try to keep the user interface clean and simple.
“Cell phone learning can make a difference” – Matthew Kam on a game-based approach for English learning in India
Matthew Kam, an Assistant Professor at Carnegie Mellon University, speaks about his recent doctoral dissertation research in Indian communities and designing E-Learning games for children from other cultural backgrounds. His MILLEE (Mobile and Immersive Learning for Literacy in Emerging Economies) project was funded by the National Science Foundation and has won several awards, including one [...]
Magic, “mumblecore”, and not exactly talkin’ bout my generation: Interview at the Berlinale with Andrew Bujalski
One film the Babbel Bloggers caught during the Berlinale (February 5-15) was “Beeswax”. This is American auteur Andrew Bujalski’s third feature, which premiered on Monday, Feb. 9th. His genre, if it can even be classified as such, has been coined as “mumblecore”. But as a talk with him made clear, in his work and in [...]
Inside Babbel.com: Curiosity is Key
The Babbel Blog team took a short trip on the UBahn over to the Berlin office of Babbel.com, the interactive language-learning platform, to speak with Ulrike Kerbstadt (right) and Sylvie Roche (left). They are Just two of the folks responsible for the learning content at the website. Click here to listen to the interview that [...]
Babbel investor Kizoo: “In business, at the end of the day, you have to trust each other”
Babbel Blog’s Interview with Frank Schüler und Matthias Hornberger of Kizoo, a Babbel investor. Schüler is Kizoo’s president and was managing director of subsidiaries of Web.de; Hornberger is Kizoo’s CFO and responsible for Finance, Controlling, Investor Relations & Corporate Affairs. (For the original German version click here) When did you first hear about the “internet”? [...]
Have the users think what you’re doing is great: Simon Murdoch on online services today
Babbel.com, our humble sponsor, recently acquired and joined forces with the online social networking site Friendsabroad.com. We caught up with Friendsabroad founder Simon Murdoch to talk a bit about this phenomenon of online language learning and the internet biz in the wake of the crunch. Babbel Blog: Please talk about Doyouspeak.com and Friendsabroad.com. What are [...]
Jason Lutes: “Making the leap from cold history to something that feels more alive”
The recently published “Berlin – City of Smoke”, playing in 1929/30, is the second book in an eventual graphic-novel triology. Its creator, Jason Lutes, talks about diving into German history without speaking German. You hadn’t been to Berlin before you started the comic – How did you make a picture for yourself? I did about [...]
