For people who aspire to learn a new language, apps like Babbel and Duolingo are bad impressions. Opening the apps 10 mins a day isn't only insignificant, it's ineffective practice. You're spending the rest of your time, outside of those 10 mins, not engaged in the language.

Babbel claims it takes its users a few minutes a day for 1-2 years to reach fluency, and it's an outright lie. People don't keep in mind all the factors that comprise a language. From cultural knowledge, thousands of words and their subtle nuances, pronunciation, hearing, etc.

You just can't compress all of that knowledge a few minutes a day, it's completely unrealistic. So when someone gives language learning apps a try and not only fails, but wastes their time, they think they're inept and lack the ability to learn a language, and it's a damn shame.