Website of the Day: Mango Languages

Updated 07/14/08 11:58 AM · Posted 09/20/07 1:00 PM by GeekSugar · 16 comments

Being able to learn a new language for free without having to travel half way around the world is something we can all appreciate. There are many online services that guarantee to have you writing and speaking a new language within months for a small fortune, naturally.

Well there's now a free site called Mango Languages that offers foreign language courses in Spanish, Russian, Greek, German, Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, Brazilian Portuguese, French, Italian and Polish.

All you have to do is enter your email address and from there you get to choose which language you want to learn. It's self-explanatory and very easy to use. If you aren't near a computer but are planning a trip abroad, there's also a program called iSpeak which you can use directly from your iPod to learn a new language. via lifehacker

To learn how to post your favorite sites to the Website of the Day group, just read more

I know that this long list looks scary, but trust me, once you get the hang of it, it'll be a snap the second time around.

First of all, join the Website of the Day group
Click "Create and Share!" on the left hand side
Choose "Blog"
Give your photo a Title
Leave the category as "general"
Change the channel to "technology and gadgets"
Add keyword(s) (for example mine for this photo was "Website of the Day")
Click on the "Add Image" link below the "body" box
A popup window will happen - click on "Browse" to find your image on your computer
Once you have the image chosen, click "Submit"
The popup will show you your image, choose size: "normal" - if you want, you can give it a title (which will show up as a caption)
Click "Insert" and the popup will go away
Your "body" box will now have some text in it. Leave it as is. If you want to add some text before the picture telling me why you love the website, do it before the code that has appeared.
Click Submit

So join the Website of the Day group and share information about all of your favorite sites! Yours just might end up on the geeksugar homepage!

Website of the Day: Mango Languages originally posted on Website of the Day

16 Comments - Post a Comment

glam sugar - 5 years ago Report Comment

Cool! I've always wanted to learn several languages.

peekaboo - 5 years ago Report Comment

it's super cute! where can we get the decals???

KadBunny - 5 years ago Report Comment

I go well? :P Ahh, cool nonetheless.

misslarue - 5 years ago Report Comment

I'll check this out for sure. I have been trying to learn Spanish for the last year.

a rebours - 5 years ago Report Comment

I hate to sound finicky since the site offers their services for free, but "I go well" is a far, far too literal translation of "Je vais bien"! Who is the heck says, in English, "I go well"?!?! I hate to rant (maybe I'm having a bad day), but this is a tiny example of the problem with online translation sites: they provide "cookie-cutter" translations that cannot process the contextual nuances of another language. Albeit, this limitation is understandable, given the complexities of language with its malleable capacity for semantic drift during cross-cultural encounters, but such sites should not give the impression that the information they are providing is always accurate. . . .okay, finished my rant.

Leopardcc - 5 years ago Report Comment

i think it is pretty cool

Mango Ryan - 5 years ago Report Comment

My name is Ryan and I'm on the development team for Mango. I'd like to thank geeksugar.com for writing about us! We respect your site as well as your audience. In reply to a rebours' comment, Mango currently mixes in literal and understood translations into each lesson. Although the literal method may seen strange and a bit abstract to the user, we expect that it will assist in identifying how these words, phrases and sentences operate contextually with their target language. In future releases, these variations will be made more apparent to the user, and may even be an optional feature. Thank you very much for your input! We listen to each and every suggestion made by our users and consider them for improving the learning experience.