TalkLikeTV

What is it?

TalkLikeTV is a language learning application designed to address common limitations in popular platforms like Babbel and Duolingo. While those tools provide a solid foundation, many users hit a plateau at the intermediate level and struggle to develop real-life conversation skills.

TalkLikeTV offers a solution by generating audio courses from user-supplied content, such as subtitle files from contemporary television shows in the target language. This approach provides several key benefits: exposure to modern slang, better comprehension of natural spoken dialogue, and greater fluency through more authentic self-expression. By practicing with customized audio content, learners gain a more immersive and practical path to advancing their language skills.

What You'll Get

What you get is simple but effective: a zip file containing MP3 audio files, typically 15 to 25 minutes long depending on the pause length you choose. The audio follows a repetition pattern.

Here's how it works:

• The first time a phrase is played, it's spoken once in your native language, then repeated twice in the language you're learning.
• Later repetitions occur with wider gaps: the phrase is said once in your native language and once in the target language.
• You'll also receive a text file containing all the phrases in the target language. You can refer to this file if you're having trouble understanding a particular phrase—but the struggle to understand is part of the learning process.

You don't need to create an account to generate or download audio files. If you provide a token equal to or greater than the cost, the files will be created and downloaded immediately.

However, creating an account has a few advantages:

• Any leftover credit from a token will be saved to your account and can be used later.
• You'll have one month to re-download a title up to three times, which is useful if you lose the files or want to change the pause or pattern.
• You can also add token credit from Ko-fi directly to your account, making it easier to manage multiple purchases or create additional titles later.

How to Get It

There are three ways to get audio files:

Option 1: Create your own audio files from a text file

Steps:

1. Choose a file to upload.
   • Supported formats include .srt (subtitle) files, lyrics, transcripts, or other plain text files.
   • It's best to choose a file in the language you want to learn—ideally from a show produced in the country whose language you're studying.
2. Parse the file at the ParseFile page.
   • If it's an .srt file, the system will automatically clean out timestamps and unnecessary formatting.
   • You're not limited to subtitles—you can input any text you'd like to learn. Up to 500 phrases per title are allowed.
   • If your file has more than 500 phrases, it will be split into multiple zipped files.
   • Long phrases will automatically be split at punctuation points.
   • After parsing, check the returned files to ensure the phrases are segmented the way you want. You may want to break longer phrases into shorter ones—shorter phrases are often easier to learn.
3. Choose the voices you'd like to use at the Create page.
   • Click the note icon next to each voice to hear a sample.
   • Recommended voice quality (best to least realistic):
     • Studio voices (most natural, but most expensive)
     • Chirp3-HD
     • Neural and Wavenet
     • Standard (least realistic, but very affordable)
4. Set the pause and pattern options.
   • Pause: This controls the time between hearing the phrase in your native language and in the target language.
     • Recommended: 10 seconds. It may feel long at first, but the delay helps reinforce recall.
   • Pattern: This determines how often each phrase is repeated across the MP3s.
     • Standard: Best for beginners and intermediate learners
     • Advanced: Fewer, more spaced-out repetitions
     • Review: Each phrase is only played once
   • If you have an account, you can change the pause and pattern values up to three times within one month of creating the title.
5. Calculate the cost.
   • Click "Calculate Cost" to get the price.
   • A $1 processing fee applies to any files $5 or less; a $2 fee applies to anything above $5.
6. Obtain a token from Ko-fi.
   • Since only whole-dollar amounts are accepted, round up to the nearest dollar.
   • If you plan to make several titles, consider getting a larger token and adding the credit to your account through Account > Add Credit.

Option 2: Create audio from an existing title

Steps:

1. Search for existing titles here by original language or exact keyword.
   • You can choose any language pair—for example, learning Finnish from German using an English subtitle file. However, for best results, choose titles originally in the language you're learning.
2. Click "Create New" to begin customizing the audio.
3. Follow steps 3 through 5 from Option 1.

Option 3: Download pre-made audio files ($1)

Steps:

1. Go to the Titles tab. Click on "To and From Language".
2. Filter by the language you want to learn and the language you want to learn from.
3. Choose a title and click "Download Existing."