After using it for over a year I no longer think of it as a five star app. I think of it as an example for another company to imitate and make better. I'll explain why. 1. The company has become greedy. The owner, Luis Von Ahn, has publicly stated he sees users as a mob of people to be ignored. As such he removed the forums. Before that he actively shadow-banned people. Before that the forums were there to help people but almost never did the help come from Duolingo. It was always other users helping out. Fixes to the many mistakes that were reported were never coming. It was a big joke. 2. The problems with the program. Many instances where the tips say one thing but you would get marked wrong if you did indeed follow the tips. You pretty much have to memorize the expected answers. That was even true of contractions. For instance "don't" versus "do not". One is wrong in many answers and the other is wrong in other answers. You have to memorize which one to use for each answer! (Though most of the time either will work.) Then there is a problem with the program. Sometimes it will freeze. Sometimes you are suppose to answer a question based on what you hear but there was no sound. Don't bother reporting it. In fact as of 2022-03-22 they removed the ability to report problems. 3. The greed. Many language learners are young and idealistic. So the company image focuses around woke images to keep the users happy. Company objectives are all woke. Many positive LGBTQ+ stories are used for teaching the language. There is a 50/50 male/female ratio of workers in the company. The company stresses climate activism. African languages are stressed. Economic equality for every country is also a company motto now. Pandering to the young on what is popular in a woke environment. Instead of working on the program and keeping their noses out of politics they are using politics to shepard the herds of young people so they can make money. 4. Finally, the free version is actually better than the paid for version. When you pay you no longer get all the gems needed for taking the tests on your mobile device which limits your progress! You are stuck on the PC version that uses "lingots" that you don't get unless you have a long history of logging on every day. The longer your streak the more you get. So don't pay and be then forced into having to build a multi-year daily habit to continue.