[billybob255]

You might add something on the landing page saying what exactly you do. I read through everything and it doesn't specify how it'll improve English; is it just drills? A therapist to coach people? Pronunciation checking software?

[znt]

Noted, I tried to use "simple language", so it wouldn't scare off non-technical people. I think I got it way too simple. Thanks.

[dsrguru]

If you simplify an explanation, it still needs to do the explaining, even if it's in the form of a high-level overview. I don't even see mention of the dialect you're teaching. Especially since you're targeting people in the STEM industry (people who tend to value knowledge and precision), I'd recommend having a more specific description available for those who want, even if it's not the first message that greets the viewer.

Since we're on the subject of what your software does, and since as a native English speaker, I don't want to [ab]use your free trial just to study its workings, could you please provide that explanation here? :) Do you teach the basics of English phonology or do you just provide [auto-generated] text for users to mimic. Do you provide Rosetta Stone-like pronunciation feedback? If you don't provide basic instruction in English phonology, I highly recommend you consider adding it. Being well versed in articulatory phonetics, I taught myself Chinese phonology (Standard Mandarin) from Wikipedia. Despite not having very good Chinese, I've passed for a native speaker in short telephone conversations on multiple occasions. Even if it takes weeks to give the student the phonetic background that I had (I don't know if it would), you'll then be able to give them near-native pronunciation almost instantly, and then they'll only need to iron out the kinks with your mimic drills before sounding like a native. I don't know if this is the approach used by most accent coaches, but it's highly effective.

[znt]

Thank you for the detailed information.

The only feedback the user gets is a score for the current phrase, and highlighting of the words that he has mispronounced.

For example: If the phrase was "Where is the closest hospital?" but you said "Where is the closest clinic?", the application would highlight correct words in green and incorrect ones (hospital in this case) in orange/red depending on the word distance of "clinic" to "hospital")

When I say "word distance" I mean Levenshtein Distance: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levenshtein_distance

I never thought about giving basic information about English phonology, but you make a very valid point. I will look into this further, and please let me know about any detailed resources about this subject.

[benjamincburns]

See here for a library of simple prose: http://splasho.com/upgoer5/library.php

Or there's always the simple english version of Wikipedia: http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

The original "Up Goer Five": http://xkcd.com/1133/