Duolingo CEO: How to Brainwash Yourself to Success and Get Addicted to Learning. Follow these habits

自己学习最难的地方，就是保持动力。

The hardest thing about learning something by yourself is staying motivated.

你怎么才能让学习像刷社交媒体一样上瘾呢？

How do you make learning as addictive as social media?

我们希望的是，你每次用Duolingo的时候，都能慢慢养成习惯，一旦养成了，就很难戒掉。

What we want is that whenever you're using Duolingo, what you're doing there is so it just takes some time to form a habit, but once you form it, it's pretty hard to get rid of it.

那些在Duolingo上连续学习两千天、一千天的人，不管多难都会坚持下去，只为不中断他们的打卡记录。

So all these people that have like a two thousand day streak on Duolingo or a thousand day streak on Duolingo, they'll go through whatever to continue their streak.

你好。

Hi.

我是路易斯·冯·安。

I'm Luis Von Ahn.

我是Duolingo的首席执行官兼联合创始人。

I am the CEO and co founder of Duolingo.

欢迎来到疲惫不堪的人群中。

Welcome to the burnouts.

非常高兴你能来。

We're so excited to have you here.

你来这儿简直太不可思议了，我记得当年我和索菲亚在斯坦福当室友时，总爱列一份清单，写上我们特别欣赏的公司。

It's crazy to have you on because I remember early on in me and Sophia, when we met as roommates at Stanford, used to write down what we loved from companies that we looked up to.

我们最佩服的一点，就是你们的营销简直太疯狂了。

And one of the biggest things that we always looked up to was your guys' marketing is insane.

我记得听过你的一期播客，你说每年光是那些小鸟形象就给你们带来了数千万美元的免费广告价值。

I remember listening to a podcast that you had, and you were saying that annually you guys generate tens of millions of free dollars in ad value from the birds.

你能说说这是怎么发生的吗？

So can you talk about how this happened?

我知道你说过，你们其实是无意中碰上了这么一个宝藏社群，但我特别想深入了解这一点。

I know you were saying it was kind of accidental that you guys struck this golden community, but I'd love to dig in there a little bit.

猫头鹰对我们来说太棒了。

The Owl has been amazing for us.

这事儿得从我们刚推出Duolingo的时候说起，那会儿距今差不多十五年了。

It started at first very early when we launched Duolingo, is now, I don't know, close to fifteen years ago.

我们一开始就想找个吉祥物。

We knew we wanted to have a mascot.

这本来就是我们想做的事。

That's that's what we wanted to do.

我们选了猫头鹰，因为在西方文化里，它代表智慧。

We came up with an owl because it's in Western cultures at least, it is a symbol of knowledge.

至于为什么是绿色的，那是因为想逗逗我们的联合创始人塞维林。

Then, it was green for it it the reason it's green is to troll our co founder Severin.

塞维林·哈克是我们公司的CTO兼联合创始人，他对设计其实不太在意。

So Severin Hacker, who's our CTO and co founder, doesn't really care about design all that much.

在决定猫头鹰设计的时候，设计团队问他：你希望它是什么样子？

And we were when we were deciding about the the owl, the the design team asked him, what do you what do you want out of this?

他说：我无所谓。

And he said, I don't care.

然后他又补充了一句：不过有件事我得说。

And then he said, but there's just one thing.

我特别讨厌绿色。

I hate the color green.

于是他们反过来想，干脆就做成绿色吧，这样能逗逗塞维林，所以这只猫头鹰才是绿色的。

And so they turned around and they thought it would be really funny to just make it green, so that's why it's a green owl to troll Severin.

之后我们就一直用这只猫头鹰。

And then we've had this owl.

后来不知谁提了个主意，说干脆把猫头鹰做成应用图标吧。

And then at some point, somebody had the idea that the owl was gonna be the the app icon.

Duolingo的应用图标，就是猫头鹰的脸。

So the app icon to Duolingo is just the face of the owl.

明白了。

Okay.

接下来，我们会推送通知，但手机上的通知总是把应用图标放在旁边。

The next thing is we send notifications, but always notifications on a phone put the app icon right next to it.

因为图标是猫头鹰的脸，看起来就像它在跟你说话一样。

So because it's the face of the owl, it looks like what is being said comes from the owl.

于是大家就开始给这只猫头鹰赋予各种性格，其实我们所有的通知听起来都像是猫头鹰在说话。

So then people started ascribing the owl, all kinds of things, you know, all our notifications essentially says if it came from the owl.

后来我们的通知变得越来越催促了。

And then our notifications started getting more and more pushy.

我们的通知机制是这样的：如果你连续五天没用App，我们就不再发提醒了。

So the way our notifications work is that after if you don't use the app after five days, we stop sending you notifications.

但最后一次提醒，有人提议应该明确告诉用户我们即将停止发送通知。

But the last notification we send you, somebody had the idea that we should tell you that we're stopping the send notifications.

所以最后一则通知会说类似这样的话：这些提醒好像没什么效果。

So the last notification we send you says something like, these reminders don't seem to be working.

我先暂停一下了。

I'm going to stop for now.

结果发现，这种方式特别有效，能让人重新回来，因为大家会觉得内疚，好像猫头鹰放弃他们了。

What it turned out is that this was a very effective way to get people to come back because people felt guilty, like the owl was giving up on them.

于是人人都开始说：这猫头鹰真是够阴阳怪气的。

So everybody started being like, oh, the owl's passive aggressive.

简直太阴阳怪气了。

It's like an extremely passive aggressive.

感觉就像我爸妈在跟我说话一样。

It feels like it's my parent telling me this.

于是网上就开始热议这只猫头鹰，大家还创作了很多梗，说它为了让你学习，简直无所不用其极。

And so the Internet just started talking about the owl, they started making memes about how the owl would go through great lengths to get you to do your lesson.

比如说，它会把你家人绑架了，就为了逼你上课之类的。

So, you know, it would kidnap your family to get you to do your lesson, etcetera.

所以，这一切就是这么开始的。

So that that's kinda how it all started.

后来我们就顺势玩起了这个梗。

And then we started leaning into it.

我们公司一合计，既然大家都这么乐呵，干嘛不加入进来一起搞笑呢？

I mean, we as a company decided, well, why not get in on the joke?

于是我们拍了一整支电视广告，就是那种特别土的律师广告——你知道的，地方台里总播的那种，说什么‘出事了就打XXX’。我们照着那个风格拍了一支，只不过主题是‘如果你被猫头鹰绑架了’，整支广告完全复刻了那种风格。

And so we started posting things like we in fact, we had a we had a whole TV commercial, where it was a one of these kinda shitty lawyer commercials that that that are, like, you know, in local TV where they're like, call blah blah blah if you've, had an accident or we we made exactly that commercial, but it was supposed to be about if you've been kidnapped by an owl, and it was like a whole lawyer commercial.

我们播出了这个广告，说实话，还挺搞笑的。

And we aired it, and it was I mean, it was pretty funny.

顺便说一下，我们做这个广告的时候，先找了一家专门拍那种低质律师广告的公司，跟他们说：嘿。

By the way, the commercial the way we created the commercial was, we first went to one of these companies that makes the shitty lawyer commercials, and we're like, hey.

我们想要一个那种低质律师广告风格的片子。

We we want one of these commercials, you know, like, shitty lawyer commercials.

他们反问：你说的‘低质’是什么意思？

And they were like, what do you mean shitty?

那时候我们才意识到，得找一家更专业的制作公司，跟他们描述什么是那种低质律师广告，他们……

Like, they did not they didn't this is when we realized we actually had to go to a very fancy, development company that and we told them about a shitty lawyer commercial, and they

他们说：明白了。

They were like, we got it.

对。

Yeah.

明白。

Got it.

我们明白你的意思。

We know what you mean.

重置。

Reset.

对。

Yeah.

其他的那些。

The other ones.

对。

Yeah.

你们是什么时候决定，用个不太恰当的说法，开始对字母L这么放飞自我的？

And when did you guys decide, for lack of a better word, to start being fucking reckless with the L?

因为我最近看到一条推文，上面说‘绿色紧身衣下面是什么’。

Because I saw recently one, it was like a tweet and it's like, this is what's under the green suit.

有个男人穿着内衣，但腹肌还挺明显的，我得说。

It's a guy literally in like underwear, but now had some very nice abs, I will say.

你们是什么时候开始有意打破这个界限，让它越来越像一个梗，还主动往这个方向靠的？

When did you guys decide to start, you know, really kind of breaking this layer and making it like more and more of a meme and leaning into it?

这是一点一点发生的。

It happened over time.

不是哪一天突然从零直接跳到一百的。

It wasn't like one day we went from zero to a 100.

我觉得我们只是试着多做一些大胆的尝试。

We just I think we just have tried to be a little more experimental with it.

每次我们往前推一步，结果都挺成功的。

And every time that we that we pushed, it was successful.

所以我们就一直这么推啊推。

So we just kept on pushing and pushing.

当然我们也有基本的底线，但总的来说，从2019年到2022年左右，你能明显看到这个东西越来越放飞了。

Of course, have guidelines about things, but generally, I would say between the years of 2019 and 2022 or so, you could see the algae is getting more and more unhinged.

就是因为每次这么干都奏效。

And it's because every time it worked.

后来有个刚入职的Z世代新人，叫扎里亚，你们就把TikTok账号交给了她。

And there was a Gen Z new hire, Zaria, who had just started and you guys entrusted her with your TikTok.

跟我们说说后来发生了什么。

Tell us about what happened.

是的。

Yeah.

我们刚雇了扎里亚，她刚从大学毕业。

So we had just hired Zaria, who had just graduated from college.

那时候，我们的市场总监——我特别欣赏的卡米——是个女性。

And, you know, she was, at the time our our head of marketing, our CMO, was a woman that I loved, Cami.

她说，在她的职业生涯里，卡米有着非常漫长而辉煌的经历。

And she said, I in my career Cami had a very long, and prestigious career.

她说，我一直以来都学到，应该让21岁的年轻人来负责营销，因为他们最懂年轻人喜欢什么。

And she said, I always learned that if that you should hire 21 year olds to do your marketing because they just know what the what the kids like.

我就说，反正我太老了，根本不懂年轻人喜欢什么。

I said, basically said, I'm too old to know what the kids like.

于是她雇了几个人，都是刚毕业的大学生。

And so she hired a few people that were basically straight out of college.

Zaria 提议我们开通一个 TikTok 账号。

And Zaria came up with this idea that she would that we would start a TikTok channel.

后来我看了我们打算发的前几条视频。

And then I was shown the first few videos that we were gonna post.

说实话，我当时根本看不懂那些视频在干嘛。

And truthfully, I had I didn't even understand them.

之后团队里又来了更多 Gen Z 的年轻人，慢慢就形成了一支专门做这个的团队，大家都特别在行。

And then after that, of course, we had more, Gen Z people in the team and then it just became a team and and they're all very good at it.

那些视频到底拍的是什么？

And what were the videos?

就是瞎玩呗。

Man, it's just doing stuff.

那时候有个说法叫 'no cap'，我现在懂了，但当时真不明白是什么意思。

You know, that one at the time, I now know what it means, but at the time there was, a saying that was like, no cap.

那时候我根本没听过这个词，心想这到底是什么意思？

At the time, I I had never heard this, and I'm like, what the hell does that even mean?

你觉得它是什么意思？

What did you think it meant?

我知道。

I know.

我完全搞不懂它指的是什么。

I had no idea what it meant.

但那个词好像跟‘no cap’有关。

I but it was it had something it was something about no cap.

后来很多人开始关注这个了。

And I guess a lot of people started looking at that.

然后过了一阵子，他们又拍了一个，

And then at some point, they did another one where

但他们是什么时候开始穿服装的？

But when did they start wearing the costume?

天哪，那从一开始就有了。

Oh no, that was from the beginning.

从一开始就有。

It was from the beginning.

就是那套服装。

Was the costume.

然后呢

And then

这事儿是怎么发生的？

How did that happen?

你们是专门去做了套服装吗？

Like, did you go and make a costume?

我们早就有一套服装了。

We had a costume already.

我们之所以有这套服装，是因为觉得参加招聘会时用得上——那时候我们会去各个学校，想办法招工程师。

And the reason we had a costume was because we thought it would be useful for job fairs where we would send during a job for like, we would go to, you know, all these schools to try to hire engineers.

我们觉得让一个人穿上这个服装会挺酷的。

We thought it would be cool to have somebody in the costume.

所以这就是有这套服装的原因。

So that was the reason for the costume.

于是我们就留着它。

So we had it.

去衣橱里找找，结果真的找到了。

Find the closet and Yeah.

有个客人在衣橱里发现了它，惊讶地说：天啊，我们还有这玩意儿。

A guest somewhere in the closet, and they're like, woah, we have this costume.

干脆拿它做点奇怪的事吧。

Let's just do weird stuff with it.

事情就这么发生了。

And that's that's kind of what happened.

后来那些行为变得越来越离谱。

They started getting progressively weirder.

有一回，他们拍了个视频，说‘天啊，是Scrub Daddy’。

At some point, they did one where it was, oh, man, scrub daddy.

我当时有孩子了。

And I'll had kids.

我就想，我的亲生孩子怎么突然冒出上百万个Scrub Daddy海绵玩具，那个视频就是这么来的。

I would like I mean, like, my own babies, what like, a million little Scrub Daddy sponges came out and that was, like, the video.

我当时完全懵了。

And I was very confused.

但那个视频居然看了两千多万次，我也说不准具体多少。

But it got that thing got, I don't know how many, 20,000,000 views or something.

那穿 costumes 的人是谁？

And who was the person wearing the costume?

这个说不准，每次都不一样。

I mean, it varies.

只要是新来Duolingo的员工，都觉得能钻进这只猫头鹰玩偶里是一次特别棒的经历。

It's a it's a anybody who starts their job at Duolingo thinks that this is a pretty amazing opportunity to be inside this OWL.

所以所有新员工都会问，我能当这只猫头鹰吗？

So all the new employees are like, can I be the OWL?

我真的能当这只猫头鹰吗？

Can I be the OWL?

一旦你当过一两次，就会发现这活儿其实特别累人，满身是汗。

Once you've been the OWL once or twice, you realize it's actually just a pretty sweaty job.

这真不是你想反复干的事。

It's not something you wanna you wanna do.

所以，确实情况不一样。

So, yeah, that that's so it varies.

如果是重要的拍摄，比如大型营销活动，需要猫头鹰做出特别精准的动作，我们就会请外部的专业舞者来演。

Now for very high stakes filming, like if we have something like a large marketing campaign or something and we actually want the owl to do some very specific stuff, we hire people that are not employees that usually are professional dancers.

他们更懂怎么动，尤其是猫头鹰要跳舞的时候，那动作得特别到位。

They know how to move much better for for the owl, especially if they I mean, we have some where the owl is, like, dancing.

对。

Mhmm.

他们是专业舞者。

They're professional dancers.

他们不是多邻国的员工，但舞跳得真不错。

They're not Duolingo employees, can't imagine, are great dancers.

我们需要一个吉祥物服装来拍TikTok视频。

We need a mascot suit for our TikToks.

我的理解就是这一点。

I mean, that that's what I'm taking away.

对我们来说，这效果还不错。

It's worked out pretty well for us.

真的效果非常好。

I mean, it's really worked out really well.

我得说，我这么着迷是因为每次刷Instagram和TikTok，都有好多账号在说，你得打造个人品牌。

I must say the reason I'm obsessed with this is because every single time I'm on my my Instagram TikTok, there are so many accounts talking about you need to grow your personal brand.

你得打造个人品牌。

You need to grow your personal brand.

但这个想法是，如果你不是那种站在台前的创始人，完全可以找一个吉祥物来代表公司，让整个社群围绕它展开，而不必非得让你自己出面。

But this idea of like, if you're not a forward facing founder, having a mascot that you can kind of have the company hide behind that becomes the community, like it doesn't need to be you as the founder's face.

你也可以用其他各种不同的营销方式。

You can also have different like marketing, you know, vehicles.

现在还有没有其他公司，你觉得在这一块做得特别好的？

Is there any other companies, you know, when you look at today that you think are doing marketing correctly in this vein?

确实有很多公司营销做得特别棒。

I mean, there's a lot of companies that I think do marketing, very well.

比如说，那些在社交媒体上营销特别出色的公司。

I mean, you know, there's the ones that do marketing really well on social media.

像过去，汉堡王、塔可钟、温迪这些品牌，一直都很擅长这个。

Like, I mean, historically, there's just been like someone like Burger King and Taco Bell and Wendy's.

它们一直以来都是这么做的。

They just like historically have done that.

但营销也不一定非得局限在社交媒体上。

But it doesn't have to be just social media.

我本人特别喜欢苹果的营销方式。

I mean, I'm I'm I'm always a huge fan of Apple marketing.

但他们的方式跟前面说的完全不一样。

They just but that's a very different vein of doing it.

所以你得找到适合自己的路子。

So I think you just have to find your niche.

你说得没错。

And, you know, it's true what you say.

就我来说，我并不喜欢出风头，性格也比较内向，不可能跑去运营社交媒体账号什么的。

I mean, in my case, I am not I don't particularly love, attention and I am generally shy, so I'm not going to be the person who's going to be out there on a social media account or something.

所以我很庆幸有这只猫头鹰来替我们出面。

So I'm very happy that we have the owl doing the job.

我们本来想请猫头鹰来参加这个播客，但他没空。

We tried to book the owl for this podcast, but he was busy.

他比我忙多了。

He's way busier than I am.

不是你。

Not you.

抱歉。

Sorry.

我想再聊聊关于给Z世代员工分配责任的事。

And I want to go back to talk to me about giving responsibility to Gen Z employees.

他们有完全的自主权。

They had free rein.

我的意思是，我们几乎没什么监督。

I mean, we just we just very little oversight.

当然还是有一些监督的，毕竟有位更成熟的主管在管着他们。

There's there's some amount of oversight and there's there's, you know, somebody that manages them that is more of an adult.

但他们基本上可以自由决定几乎任何事。

But they have they have pretty free rein to to do almost whatever they want.

结果还不错。

And that has worked out pretty well.

所以你们不再审核TikTok视频了？

So you don't review the TikTok's anymore?

不看了。

I don't.

我一开始看了两三条，很快就意识到我根本没必要看，因为完全看不懂他们在搞什么。

I I I, you know, I reviewed the first two or three and it was pretty clear that it was useless for me to review them because I didn't even understand them.

我就想，这到底是什么玩意儿啊。

I'm like, I don't I don't know what this is.

真的假的。

No cap.

没错。

Yeah.

真的假的。

No cap.

不过我不看，但我们市场部负责人Manu会看。

But I don't review them, but we have our head of marketing Manu.

目前的规定是，如果社交媒体负责人觉得内容可能会引发争议，就应该向自己的主管请教。

The the rule right now is if the if the social media manager believes that it's going to be somewhat controversial, they should ask their manager.

我们有一位非常出色的品牌负责人，叫Kat Chan。

And so that we have this person who is our head of brand, who is awesome, Kat, Kat Chan.

如果她觉得内容有争议，就去问我们的首席营销官Manu。

And then if she thinks it's going to be controversial, she should ask our CMO Manu.

如果他认为有争议，就会来问我。

And if he thinks it's gonna be controversial, he asks me.

但到现在为止，还没到他来问我这一步。

But it has not gotten to the point where he asks me.

从来没发生过？

Never?

没有。

No.

我觉得应该没有。

I don't think so.

真的，有一半发出来的东西，我根本想不通哪里好笑，也不明白怎么会有人不喜欢。

Really, half of the stuff that gets posted, I'm like, I don't even know why this is funny or why it would be and where anybody would not like it.

所以我其实不太适合当这个审核人。

So I'm I'm not a good reviewer for this.

我想聊聊你们公司整体的理念，因为你之前多次提到特别重视招聘应届毕业生。

And I wanna talk about generally your kind of philosophy as a company because you've talked a lot about investing particularly in new grad hires.

是的。

Yes.

你们为什么做出这个决定？面对这么多从学校出来的优秀年轻人，你们是怎么筛选，最终决定谁能加入多邻国的？

Why did you make that decision and how do you screen when so many young talented people are coming out of college to actually figure out who gets, you know, a job at Duolingo?

对。

Yeah.

自从创办多邻国以来，我们一直都在直接招聘刚毕业的学生，而且数量不少。

I mean, we're, we're, we're the whole time that we've been at Duolingo, we've hired people straight out of college, a lot of them.

一开始，我觉得是因为公司是在宾夕法尼亚州的匹兹堡成立的。

At first, I think it started because we started the company in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

招应届生更容易一些。

It was easier to hire new grads.

应届生愿意搬到匹兹堡，但那些更有经验的人往往有家庭，搬家就没那么方便了。

New grads were willing to move to Pittsburgh, whereas I think, you know, more established people, a lot of times they have families, so it's kinda harder to move.

所以我们一开始就开始招应届生。

So that's why we started hiring new grads.

另外，我以前在卡内基梅隆大学当教授，这也就是我们为什么在匹兹堡。

Also, it used to be the case that I used to be a professor at Carnegie Mellon University, and that's why we were in Pittsburgh.

所以我认识不少大学生。

So I I knew a lot of college students, I guess.

这就是我们当初这么做的原因。

So that's why we started.

但随着时间推移，我们逐渐形成了这套应届生招聘项目。

But over time, we just have this new grad program.

我们一半的员工，都是以应届生的身份加入多邻国的。

About half of our employees, have come to Duolingo as a new grad.

作为前教师，你现在会给学生什么建议，和以前一样吗？

And as a former teacher, I mean, advice do you give to students now that you did back then?

总的来说，你希望学生从你的职业经历和经验中学到什么？你最想分享的建议是什么？

Like just generally in terms of what you want students to take away from like your career, from your learnings, like, well, what are your biggest pieces of advice?

这得看具体是什么情况。

Well, depends on what it is for.

我是说，对学生而言，学习最重要的是养成习惯。

I mean, it's students, I mean, learning the most important thing about learning is just making a habit.

有些东西一两个小时就能学会，比如修水龙头，但像数学这类科目，得花好几年才能掌握。

You know, there's some stuff that you can learn in an hour or two, fixing a faucet, but things, you know, like these subjects like math or whatever, it takes years to learn.

学语言也是同样的道理。

Same with learning a language.

学一门语言，真的得花好几年。

It just takes years to learn a language.

所以最重要的是，想办法养成持续学习的习惯。

So the most important thing is just do what you can to build a habit.

所以这是对学生的建议。

So that's, that's for students.

而对于刚毕业、比如在多邻国工作的人，最重要的建议是找到自己能发挥作用的方式。

Now, for people who have recently graduated, and that work at Duolingo, for example, I mean, biggest advice is to find your, find, find a way to be useful.

这能让你走得更远。

That takes you pretty far.

我脑子里有个故事，每次新员工入职我都会讲，而且是真的。

I, I hope I have a story that I tell inside Duolingo to all the new employees, which happens to be a true story.

多邻国早期有两位工程师。

Early on at Duolingo, there were two engineers.

其中一位不断来找我，说我们没有博客。

One of them kept on coming to me and saying, we don't have a blog.

我们应该有个博客。

We should have a blog.

为什么我们还没有博客？

Why don't we have a blog?

他们一直抱怨，整整几个月都在抱怨。

And they kept on complaining, like months of complaining.

我们根本没有博客。

We didn't have a blog.

后来有一天，另一位工程师直接来找我，说：我注意到咱们没博客，就自己建了一个。

And then the second engineer one day just came to me and said, I noticed we didn't have a blog, so I started one.

与其抱怨没有博客，不如自己动手做一个，这可强多了。

That's way better, than complaining of not having a blog.

所以，我在Duolingo经常跟新员工讲这个故事：别光抱怨，想办法让自己变得有用。

So I, this is a kind of story that I use inside Duolingo for people just, just make yourself useful as opposed to trying to complain.

只会抱怨的人，没什么用。

Complainers not useful.

Duolingo现在是一家市值数十亿美元的公司，

And Duolingo is a, as a multi billion dollar company.

你们招聘的时候最看重什么？

What do you look for when you're hiring?

当然，他们在自己的领域里很出色。

Certainly, good at their craft.

所以不管你的专业是什么，比如你是设计师，我们就会仔细看你的作品集。

So whatever it is your craft is, I mean, if you're a designer, we really look at your portfolio.

如果是工程师，我们也会确保你真的精通自己的技术。

If you're an engineer, you know, we want to make sure that you're great at your craft.

当然，这一点我们也会看。

Certainly, we'll look at that.

但除此之外，我们更看重你是否真正认同我们的使命。

But then on top of that, we look at whether people are really believe in our mission.

在Duolingo工作的大多数人，都真心相信这个使命。

Most of the people that work at Duolingo really believe in the mission.

所以我们特别关注这一点。

So we look at that.

还有一点，我们有个不成文的规定：当你想招人的时候，通常是因为团队里缺了一个人，需要补上这个空缺。

And then the other thing, we have this rule, it's kind of an informal rule, but, you know, whenever you're trying to hire somebody, it's because you have a hole in the organization that you're trying to fill.

我们有个不成文的规矩：宁可留个空缺，也别招个让人讨厌的人。

The informal rule is better to have a hole than an asshole.

所以我们非常努力地避免雇用这样的人。

So we try very hard not to hire assholes.

光靠面试不一定能看出来，但有时候确实能察觉到。

You can't always tell from an interview, but sometimes you can.

然后我们就觉得，算了，这个人我们不雇了。

And we're like, yeah, we're not gonna hire that person.

你们众所周知，会付钱给出租车司机，让他们反馈面试的高管平时是怎么对待他们的。

And you famously have paid taxi drivers to to tell you how your executives that you're interviewing have treated them.

现在这事儿已经传开了，所以大家都对司机特别客气。

By now, this is the word is out, so people, people treat their drivers very well.

但这一招现在不管用了。

But one, but it doesn't work anymore.

不过以前我们面试时，有一项就是看他们怎么对待司机。

But one part of the interview for us was, was how they treated their driver.

我的意思是，我们确实曾打算录用一个人。

I mean, and, and there was a one hire that we were going to make.

我们找首席财务官找了整整一年，有个人我们大家都很喜欢，简历也非常出色，但后来发现，他从机场到公司的路上对司机特别刻薄。

We had been looking for a chief financial officer for like a year, and there was this one person that we all really liked, had a really strong resume, and then it turned out that they were pretty mean to their driver, from the airport to the to to the office.

这让我们决定不录用他，因为我们的理念是——我真的相信这一点——如果一个人对司机都这么刻薄，那他对下属和其他人也多半不会好。

And that made us not not hire them because, you know, our belief is, and I really believe in this is that, you know, if they're going be mean to the driver, it probably going to be mean to other people, particularly people under them.

所以我们不想招这样的人。

And so I, we did not want that.

你们公司有16%的员工专注于设计。

And 16% of your workforce is focused on design.

能说说这方面的情况吗？

Can you talk about that?

你之前提到你和联合创始人并不是专业设计师，虽然重视设计，但你们俩都不是设计出身。

When you said you and your co founder are not big designers, you care about design, but neither of you are designers by trade.

你们的教育背景非常出色，但没有一个是学设计的。

You have an incredible educational background, but none of it's in design.

你们是怎么做出这个决定的？

How did you guys make that decision?

那么，这么庞大的设计团队究竟是什么样的？

And what does a giant design workforce like that look like?

是的。

Yeah.

我们的设计团队规模很大。

We have our design team is large.

大概有16%的公司员工都是做设计的。

It's it's something like 16% of our of our of our entire company is design.

我们招了很多刚毕业的设计新人，同时也聘请了一些有经验的设计师。

We hire a lot of fresh grad designers, but we also hire some more experienced ones.

这最初是因为公司早期有几位员工，对多邻国影响很大，本身就是非常出色的设计人才。

It started out because we had a couple of employees, very early employees who were very influential at Duolingo, that were just really good designers.

其中一位是泰勒·墨菲，他现在还在公司。

One of them is Tyler Murphy, who's still who's still with us.

他们吸引了其他非常优秀的设计师，渐渐形成了一种良性循环，顶尖人才不断吸引来更多顶尖人才。

And they just attracted attracted other really good designers and it just became this, kind of snowball that it just really good talent attracted more really good talent.

这个规模后来变得越来越大。

And that that just grew a lot.

还有件事发生在几年前，我们收购了底特律一家设计工作室，那可是世界闻名的设计团队。

The other thing that happened was a few years ago, we bought a design studio in Detroit, which is, you know, it was a world renowned design studio.

现在我们在底特律设了一个办公室，大概有四十人。

And now so now we have this office in Detroit with about 40 people.

他们全是艺术家或者设计师。

They're all either artists or designers.

这对我们帮助特别大。

And that I mean, that has done wonders for us.

你看看Duolingo这个应用，设计得非常出色，不只是设计好，动画也做得特别到位。

I mean, you look at the Duolingo app, it's all very well designed, but not just very well designed, very well animated.

你要是仔细看那些动画，真的会注意到，它们简直太出色了。

If you look at the animations, mean, you actually pay attention, the animations are incredible.

这些都是艺术家手工完成的。

And they're all done by hand with, you know, by artists.

所以你们在测试或者做各种实验的时候，是设计团队在负责，还是另有专门的团队？

So when you guys are testing or doing different experiments, is that the design team running that or is that a separate team?

我们负责产品的是三个独立的职能板块。

So we have three three separate functions that run product.

分别是工程、产品管理和设计。

It's engineering, product management, and design.

我们管这叫EPD。

We call it EPD.

这三个板块一起完成所有这些工作。

Those three functions together do all of that.

通常，Duolingo 会被分成很多小组。

Usually, Duolingo is split up in a bunch of teams.

我现在都记不清我们到底有多少个小组了。

I don't even know how many teams we have now.

可能超过五十个了。

It's probably more than 50.

每个团队都有工程师、设计师和产品经理，大家一起决定该做什么。

And each team has engineers, designers, and product managers, and they all decide what to do.

但各个团队基本上是独立运作的，各自决定自己的工作重点。

But each team operates pretty independently from the other teams, and they come up with what to what to do.

不过设计师在这个过程中有极大的发言权。

But designers have a huge say in this.

我想稍微转变一下话题，更多地聊聊学习和教育本身。

And I I wanna kind of pivot the direction of this conversation to focus more on learning and education at large.

这正是多邻国的使命所在。

That's the mission really of Duolingo.

我看过你关于‘让学习像社交媒体一样让人上瘾’的TED演讲。

And I I had watched your TED Talk about basically wanting to make learning as addictive as social media.

这句话到底是什么意思？人们能从中得到什么启发？

What does that mean and what can people take away from that lesson?

是的

Yeah.

说到底，自己学东西最难的地方就是保持动力。

I mean, the the the hardest thing about learning something by yourself is staying motivated.

其实我们早就知道，学习是有方法的。

I mean, we learned this a long time ago that that just, you know, there's a way to learn.

比如在Duolingo出现之前，学语言的方法就已经有很多了。

For example, before Duolingo, are many ways to learn languages.

想学什么都有不少途径，但最难的还是坚持下去。

There's many ways to learn anything you want, but the hard thing is staying motivated.

比如，你完全可以通过读维基百科免费学量子物理，但大多数人根本做不到。

For example, you really can just learn quantum physics for free by just reading Wikipedia, but most people don't do that.

你必须找到一种能让自己持续保持动力的方式。

You really need to find a way to get to stay motivated.

所以Duolingo一直以来的核心工作，就是让这款应用尽可能吸引人。

So that's been the main thing we've worked on at Duolingo is making the app to be as engaging as we can.

我们现在知道，还没到TikTok那种让人上瘾的程度。

Now we know it's not as engaging as TikTok.

说实话，想跟猫咪视频或者各种梗竞争，确实很难。

I mean, it's hard to compete with cats or, you know, all the other memes.

但我觉得，怎么说呢，大概有TikTok八成那么吸引人吧，反正挺有吸引力的。

But I think, you know, it's, I don't know what fraction, 80% as engaging, some some amount as engaging.

我觉得很多人心里其实用TikTok或者刷社交媒体时会有点愧疚，但用Duolingo的时候就不会。

And I think that people also internally, a lot of them feel bad when they're using something like TikTok or social media, but they don't feel bad when they're using Duolingo.

所以我们希望，只要做到跟社交媒体差不多有趣，剩下的那百分之十到二十，就靠用户自己的动力了。

So our hope is that we just have to be kind of close to as fun as social media, and then the last 10 to 20% people's internal drive gets them.

不过说实话，我们确实花了很多心思，想让Duolingo更吸引人。

But yeah, we really spent a lot of time trying to make Duolingo more, more engaging.

你们怎么平衡想让人学语言，却又让人花大量时间刷手机、上瘾这个问题呢？

How do you counterbalance this idea of wanting to have people learn a language, but then also spending a lot of time on their phones, like getting addicted to an app?

也就是说，你们的底线在哪里？

Like where, where do you draw the line?

我的意思是，

I mean,

在我们看来，你使用Duolingo的时候，每一件事都应该是对你有益的。

the way we see it is, you what we want is that whenever you're using Duolingo, what you're doing there is positive for you.

我们做的不只是教语言，顺便说一句。

So everything we have on Duolingo, we don't just teach languages, by the way.

语言是主要的，但我们现在还增加了数学、音乐，还有国际象棋。

We that's the main thing we teach, but we now have math, music, and also chess.

我们希望，你在平台上做的每一件事都能带来正面影响。

And just we want it to be the case that everything that you can do there is positive.

这正是我们努力的方向。

That's that's what we're trying to do.

国际象棋挺有意思，因为我一开始其实反对把它加进来，觉得那只是个游戏。

Chess was an interesting one because I actually, at first, said that we should not have chess on Duolingo because I thought it's just a game.

我当时的想法是，不如加数学，别加国际象棋。

I wanted to have you know, I'm like, let's have math, not chess.

但后来我跟危地马拉的教育部长聊了聊，这位女士告诉我，危地马拉的公立教育系统根本运转不好，糟糕到她甚至考虑给每个学生都送一副国际象棋，至少孩子们能学会逻辑思维。

But then when I talked to the person who was the minister of education of Guatemala, this woman who said to me, look, the the education system, the public education system in Guatemala is is not working very well, and it is, doing so badly that I am considering sending a chess set to every student because at least they'll learn logical thinking.

她跟我说了这番话之后，我就想，也许我们真该在Duolingo里加入国际象棋，这就是我们后来加它的原因。

When she said that to me, I'm like, oh, maybe we should have chess on Duolingo, that's why we added it.

我们就是希望，家长能放心地把Duolingo推荐给孩子，说：你尽管玩吧，别客气。

So we just want we want it to be the case that a parent feels good giving it to their children and saying, go nuts on Duolingo.

这正是我们想要的效果。

That's kind of what we want.

我想聊聊教育对你的影响，以及它如何促使你创办了Duolingo。

I want to talk about education and its role in your life and how that affected you starting Duolingo.

是的。

Yeah.

我出生并成长在危地马拉，那是个贫穷的国家。

I mean, I so I I was born and I grew up in Guatemala, which is a poor country.

我很幸运，虽然家里只有我和妈妈，而妈妈并不富裕，但我却接受了富人般的教育。

I was very fortunate that I received the education of a rich person, even though, I mean, it was just me and my mother, and my mother was not rich.

我妈妈是医生，但她为政府工作。

My mother was a doctor, but she worked for the for the state.

在危地马拉，为政府工作的医生收入并不高。

And in Guatemala, a doctor that works for the state don't make a lot of money.

但我很幸运，我是独生子女，所以她几乎把所有多余的收入，也就是除了伙食之外的钱，都花在了我的教育上。

But I was fortunate that I was an only child, and so she spent essentially all of her extra income or that she didn't spend on, like, food on my education.

于是我上了所不错的学校，能明显看出我和邻居孩子们学的东西不一样。我住的社区算中产，但那些孩子都上的是危地马拉普通学校，质量实在一般。

So I I went to a fancy school and I could see the difference between what I was learning and what my neighbors were learning, who because of the neighborhood that I lived in, was a middle class neighbor, none of them they were all going to, like, your average school in Guatemala, is not particularly good.

正因如此，我才有机会来美国上大学，等等。

And then, of course, because of that, I was able to come to The United States for college, etcetera, etcetera.

这真的带来了天翻地覆的改变。

So it's just it just really made a humongous difference.

我不只是从邻居身上看到这点，整个在危地马拉长大的经历都让我明白，很多人说教育能促进社会平等，但我一直觉得恰恰相反。因为最终的结果是——在美国也一样——有钱人能买得起顶尖的教育。

And I saw it not just with my neighbors and everything, but in the, you know, by just growing up in Guatemala, you really see a lot of people talk about education as something that can bring equality to different social classes, but I always saw it as the opposite because what ended up happening, and you see this in The US too, is people who have a lot of money can buy themselves really fancy educations.

而正因为接受了这么好的教育，他们才能找到高薪工作，继续赚大钱。

And therefore, because they have such fancy educations, they can get really good jobs and keep making a lot of money.

而那些没钱的人，往往学不到多少东西。

Whereas people who don't have a lot of money you know, don't learn very much.

在贫穷国家，人们连基本的读写都很难掌握。

In in in poor countries, they barely learn how to read and write.

正因为如此，他们几乎不可能赚到多少钱。

And because of that, they can, you know, they can never really make a lot of money.

这就是为什么Duolingo是一家如此注重使命的公司。

So that's the the the reason why, you Duolingo know, is such a mission driven company.

所以我们提供免费产品，而且一定要确保每个人都能一直免费使用，因为我们真正想做的是让每个人都能平等地获得教育机会。

That's why we have a free product, and that's why we wanna make sure that the free product is always available for everybody because what we wanna do is really try to give equal access to education to everyone.

我觉得，Duolingo的用户覆盖了各个阶层。

And I think with, you know, for sure, we have users in the whole spectrum of Duolingo.

一方面，比如叙利亚难民，或者经济条件很差的人，他们学英语是为了找份稍微好一点的工作等等。

So on the one side of the spectrum, I mean, have, again, Syrian refugees or people who really don't have a lot of money who are trying to learn English to get a a slightly better job, etcetera.

另一方面，也有亿万富翁、名人等等。

And on the other side of the spectrum, have, you know, billionaires, famous people, etcetera.