I like this site a lot. I think it would be great if lingq could tell us when points will expiration. I would reather give the points to some then lose them.
2015-08-26 -500.00 Points expiration
2015-08-22 -291.00 Points expiration
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Personally, I donât see any good reason why do they have to disappear at all. When my points which I had bought by extra money (not as a gratis points) suddenly disappeared, Iâve just stopped to buy them. Although Iâm fully respectful for founders of linq, that kind of things are very discouraging.
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For me, points are like a strange form of demurrage currency that just wash away before I even realise I had them, let alone figure out what to do with them. This month for me:
2015-08-04 -1148.00 Points expiration
Nobody thinks that the LingQ point is reliable as a currency for the Exchange system. The deficiency in the function of âstoring valueâ is related to this issue. The after-90-days expiration rule should be abolished or lengthened.
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Youâre losing 33% value every month. Itâs a form of demurrage charge. But at such a high interest, 400% annually, it loses all the benefits of a demurrage charge (for example encouraging use, turnover and âmoneyâ velocity). A 5% charge per month would encourage use and turnover, whilst protecting actual value.
I donât participate in any âpointsâ activity for this very reason. Itâs a shame, really, because I would be more inclined to participate otherwise, and the argument âwe donât want people hoarding pointsâ never made sense to me.
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LingQ is an evolving project, slowly growing and constantly looking at how best to provide an ideal language learning environment for the greatest number of users and contributors, all of whom have different needs and expectations.
One of the features at LingQ that I enjoy is the availability of resources in our library. The confiscated points flow to the people who provide lessons in our library. I personally donât think it is unfair to place a time limit on the points, especially since they can be donated to other members. If you sign up for a class at school you canât just show any time you want, indefinitely, to participate in classes.
It is possible that one day our policy on how we generate content and reward content providers will change because circumstances will have changed. At that time we may also look at the points confiscation issue differently.
We are listening to your views but a number of things need to be taken into consideration before we make any changes. For now I suggest people make a point of checking their available points from time to time, or even scheduling discussions with tutors well ahead of time to ensure that points are used up.
Steve wrote like this:
âThe confiscated points flow to the people who provide lessons in our library. I personally donât think it is unfair to place a time limit on the points, especially since they can be donated to other members.â
I am interested in the following things:
-
How many points are âconfiscatedâ every month? Do you think the amount is too large or so small that it is negligible?
-
Are you at this moment trying to minimize the amount of the âunusedâ points for the benefit of the members who bought the points, or maximize it for the purpose of giving them to the members who provide lessons in the library?
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What percentage do the âconfiscatedâ points occupy in the total resource for allocating points to the members who provide lessons? That is, how heavily is the âdonationâ to the content providers dependent on the confiscated points? If nobody âwastesâ his or her points, does this cause any trouble to the comapany? Do you really and truly think that encouraging the members to use up all of the points they bought is important?
P.S.
Incidentally, have you noticed this issue?
âThe confiscated points flow to the people who provide lessons in our library.â
I have already covered annual fees, so why do I have to pay again thoughâŚ
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Yutaka, weâre looking into the ipad mini issue reported. I wasnât able to reproduce it so Iâve ask the technical to have a look. Iâll give you an update as soon as possible. Thanks!
Thank you for your reply, KiranLingQ.
@ Steve
My feeling is that the point expiration stuff is a mistake. It discourages so many people from using the site. I think that a better system would be to abolish the point expiration and instead make the points more expensive. The extra money can be used to pay for points for the content providers.
Of course, this idea may look good on paper, but might not be practical in reality. Do you have any idea how much more expensive the points would have to be for this idea to work?
Maybe an even better idea would be to make the price for the full membership a tiny bit higher. In a way that makes sense because there is no real connection between buying points and using the content in the library. It is a bit strange that it is the people who buy points that have to pay for the reward for the content providers. I use so much content in the library and I never buy points.
3 Likes
âThere is no real connection between buying points and using the content in the library. It is a bit strange that it is the people who buy points that have to pay for the reward for the content providers.â
This is a very important point. I wonder if the âconfiscatedâ points have been the only source for giving points to content providers.
âCan I convert my points to cash?
Yes, you can convert points into cash but you will need a minimum of 10,000 points ($100) to do so. Note that a 25% commission will be withheld by LingQ when you cash out.However, there is no commission for points earned from referrals or sharing lessons.â Community Help
âA 25% commissionâ is also âconfiscatedâ from the tutors who accumulate more than 9,999 points within three months. (This is not the case when you âshare lessonsâ.)
I imagine that some part of the points âconfiscatedâ from the tutors in this way is also used as the source for rewarding. (Of course, I do not know if the 25% commission is too high or too low.)
P.S.
âA new LingQ Membership levelâ A New Lingq Membership Level - Language Forum @ LingQ
This opinion should not be disregarded.
In principle, some members are supposed to pay $20 for 1,000 points($200 for 10,000 points).
(This exchange rate is at variance with the one applied to the cashing-out procedure mentioned above. This fact is very intriguing. )
2 Likes
âIt is a bit strange that it is the people who buy points that have to pay for the reward for the content providers.â
There is very little points reward for content providers.
Most people provide content out of sense of giving something back to LingQ.
The points rewards to content providers is also weighted to give more return (on effort) to providing shorter simpler lessons rather than interesting, native level, decent length lessons. Itâs just flawed all around.
LingQ would be a better business if it had a separate cost option around premium content, imo. There is also, possibly, cost effective opportunities for putting interesting native content onto lingq, cheaply and efficiently, that have never really been bottomed out.
This was one idea :
And this was an example of a result of that:
1 Like
Suppose that you get 10,000 points by paying the company 200 dollars with no discount and spend all the points within three months. If one tutor receives the whole amount of points from you, he or she can cash them, but must pay a 25% commission, that is, 2,500 points. Then, how much will he or she actually be paid in money terms? Only 75 dollars. You can see how 200 dollars changes into 75 dollars. More than sixty percent of the original 200 dollars accrues to the company.
Points, points, points⌠Iâm ready for a good time⌠points, points, points⌠Iâm read for your love
Imagine an apple, those are the points. When you book a lesson with a tutor you give that apple to the tutor. But before that apple gets to the tutor, Lingq bites 1/4 out of it, that is the 25% in âLingq-taxesâ. 15 minute conversations cost 500 points and the tutor gets 375 points.
The apple will keep moving inside Lingq and Lingq will get 25% very time âthe apple movesâ from student to tutor. The apple just keeps getting smaller and smaller and smaller. Lesser points âin the systemâ as time goes by.
If by any chance you want and can cash out your points, Lingq gets its 25% âLingq-taxâ AGAIN!!! (*)
5$ for 15 miniutes end up being ⌠2,81$ when they get outside Lingq. Almost half of it is âgoneâ. You end up receiving 56,2% from the 500 points the student gave to Lingq for a Skype conversation. I find 56,2% commission is WAY TOO MUCH, but maybe thatâs just me.
No wonder why tutors are discouraged to offer conversations, huh?.
Lingq rules, they are entitled to do as they please. And they need to get money to run the website, of course!. Nobody is saying they should do this for free. Lingq has to be profitable, otherwise theyâll have to close the website. And we donât want that. But I also believe Lingq could do things better and I hope some day they will.
Berta
IDEL, Spanish lessons at Lingq
(*)Except if those points are from the providers reward, then they are nice and donât bite âthe appleâ, thank you Lingq!.
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âImagine an apple, those are the points. When you book a lesson with a tutor you give that apple to the tutor. But before that apple gets to the tutor, Lingq bites 1/4 out of it, that is the 25% in âLingq-taxesâ. 15 minute conversations cost 500 points and the tutor gets 375 points.â
I did not notice this aspect. I only thought about the 25% commission in cashing the LingQ points. It seems that the points the members buy could be âconfiscatedâ completely in the long run in the exchange or market system, without the notorious after-three-months expiration rule. What an âelaborateâ system we have at LingQ! I wonder whether this âtaxâ is only applied to the âSpeakingâ service.
P.S.
1 
( 1 - 0.25 ) ( 1 - 0.25 ) ( 1 - 0.25 ) ( 1 - 0.25 ) ( 1 - 0.25 ) ⌠= 0
1 ( 1 - 0.25 )
- 1 ( 1 - 0.25 ) ( 1 - 0.25 )
- 1 ( 1 - 0.25 ) ( 1 - 0.25 ) ( 1 - 0.25 )
. . .
= 1
P.S.
According to Mikeâs recent explanation, the exchanges of points between members are now free from the âcommissionâ charge. I wonder whether this is related to the introduction of the notorious point-expiration rule, the date of which I am interested in. When was it?
All points from the exchange that you cash out have that commission.
â5$ for 15 miniutes end up being ⌠2,81$ when they get outside Lingq. Almost half of it is âgoneâ. You end up receiving 56,2% from the 500 points the student gave to Lingq for a Skype conversation. I find 56,2% commission is WAY TOO MUCH, but maybe thatâs just me.â
(1-0.25)â§2=0.56
1-0.56=0.44
44% commission?
1 Like
âHow does the Points Discount work?
The undiscounted price of points is $20 for 1000 points. Paying accounts will get a discount of 50% and will pay $10 for 1000 points.â
I believe that the points âdiscountâ should be only for members who want to âbuyâ points. âBuyersâ welcome any discount on condition that the intrinsic value is not changed. There is no reason for applying this âdiscountâ when tutors cash the points they earned. âThe undiscounted price of points is $20 for 1000 points.â I think this rule should be applied to the cashing-points procedure. Tutors should be âpaidâ according the original exchange rate, that is, $10 per 500 points.
Five hundred points should be regarded as ten dollars. This is the âfundamentalâ equation of the exchange rate. If five hundred points is regarded as five dollars by both the company and the tutors, getting a discount of 50% and paying â$10 for 1000 pointsâ does not make any sense from the point of view of the paying members who buy points from the company. There is no real âdiscountâ here.