Today I'm announcing a project that I've been working on for a while:

Langwag: A mega interactive language learning app. It supports more than 30 languages. The idea is that you can copy and paste any news story into it to get a personalised translation and language lesson.

I've found this to be a satisfying way of learning since I spend a lot of time reading the news anyway. It seems to work well because it's driven by your interests – and so it's much more interactive than slot machine Owl-based alternatives. A friend said she understood more than expected because she already knew the “characters” (orange guy, drunk FBI guy, torso rocket guy, you know).

It has a bunch more features, inspired by what I've found I actually need to help me learn French while living in France: look up and practice phrases, hear things read out loud, ask questions. It also has a cute dog logo. I have ideas for improvements, but really it's over now to you, the world: what would you like to see?

There is a hopefully pretty good demo on the public site so you can see how it works. You can add a few of your own news stories for free and, if it clicks for you, Early Adopter access is just $5 / month – less than a lactose free venti iced chai latte with lavender cold foam (a real drink that I learned about yesterday).

Dan