Ever wanted to learn a foreign language from the comfort of your home? Then you can’t go wrong with RosettaStone SharedTalk ( the name is quiet a mouthful isn’t it?)
SharedTalk is a language exchange community, through which you can learn from 
113 languages of 175 countries. It provides you learning opportunities not only through text but also through voice chat amongst it’s members. You can become a member of the community for free and set up your own profile. After setting up your profile you can search for members who speak the language of your interest. On the main page, this search is shown under Find a Language Partner. Apart from learning languages from native speakers, you can also discover their culture, hobbies and interests, and this is the most interesting part; you are more likely to learn slang and informal expressions than in a classroom or a book. Interesting isn’t it? Talk about plus points!
Although the features that SharedTalk boasts of aren’t that innovative or anything different then other social networking websites, the community that it targets is what makes it different then the others. It claims to be a Rich Internet Application specially built to be the fastest, lightest and most efficient tool possible. How it manages to achieve that is beyond me, as Facebook turns out to be much more efficient and feature rich than this community and the voice chat feature can be added through the use of Facebook Applications. The Unicode character support is good as it wont have any trouble displaying different languages.
Overall, it’s a good targeted community, but they’ve just listed normal social network features as their main points. They have no expert or specialists to guide you, or any video tutorials to help you in your thirst to learn other languages which would have really made it something special, but till then it’s just worth a shot.
Be careful with SharedTalk. If they decide you, or possibly anyone in the same chat room as you, said anything they didn’t like, you will be banned. Possibly forever. There will be no warning, there is no block function, and SharedTalk will not reply to any requests for clarification. I have read on other boards that just giving someone your hotmail or yahoo ID can be enough to get you kicked off. Also, it seems that you cannot discuss slang terms in other languages, as these could potentially “offend” someone – even though they are a legitimate part of learning a language. Likewise anything that could be considered romantic. This is of course all conjecture, since there is no way to know why someone was banned.
The ban may be for the life of your computer – you cannot login and create a new account, for example, using the same computer that was banned. They will display an unfriendly message and their site will lock up, and there is no “appeal decision” button.
If you’re using this in a classroom, please bear in mind that once one student makes a comment worthy of banishment, nobody will be able to use that computer for SharedTalk again (unless RosettaStone changes their policy).
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ismail canli Reply:
October 22nd, 2011 at 5:31 am
hello im ismail from turkey.i have banned by sharedtalk and now i will tell
how i unblock ban.i cant use my old account and i registered for new account.
for turkey registrations are temprorily disabled so firstly i change my ip by usin
hotspotshield and my ip now is from usa.so registrations from usa is open and
i got new account.
after registration you have to change your hdd serial number download
volumeserial.exe software and change all drives serials (no risk).you have to
restart windows and u also have to reset modem or change ip by hotspot shield
before registration to sharedtalk.when you got new account succesfully.you can log in
sharedtalk again.
principles:
1.clearing cookies by ccleaner or other cleaning programmes
2.changing ip by hotspot shield to hide your old ip aand register from usa
3.getting new account by registration.
4.changing hdd serial number by using volumeserial.exe programme(find it from google)
i tried many times.so found at last and advise you
you will succeed in unbanning if you believe as me.
good lucks
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Wilson Reply:
November 7th, 2011 at 4:25 am
Hi Ismail, can you guide me more on this, wil be thankful
contact me on eagle_eyes27@hotmail.com
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jorge Reply:
January 24th, 2012 at 11:13 pm
I changed my ip but then they block me when i wanted to use the ext chats,
the link is bloked why?????????????????????????????/ whyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
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hello
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What if you change your IP address? Because I was banned (don’t know why) and I really like that site
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the link is bloked why?????????????????????????????/ whyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
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I know how to get rid of this ban…you can still use this website no matter how many times you got banned…
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chekla Reply:
August 23rd, 2010 at 3:43 am
so how? I’m really interessting how can I get rid of this ban?
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I signed up this morning but now I do not exist……this is really sad since it seems like a great idea but not if you disapear ……SAD very SAD it would be nice if it were real
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Iv had the same thing I got banned 3 times and once when i was in the middle of a convosation O_o without any explanation, i think we should protest or something XD or have a voteing poll something to get there attention so they actually do something about it. >:( And i met alot of nice people and never said anything bad.
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Rachel said:
…i think we should protest or something XD or have a voteing poll something to get there attention…
I agree. and one more thing:
THEY(sharedTalk) ARE SO UNCIVILIZED
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Use a program called CCleaner. It will clear the information they use to identify your computer which will enable you to sign up again without any problems. Be sure not to use your old password or username when you resign up or they will boot you straight away.
It really is ridiculous the way they treat their users…
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Hey I’m using Mac now and I can’t seem to write Korean in sharedtalk! Anyone knows? Help me!
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I have used ccleaner and now i am not getting banned warning but i am not receiving Activation code for the new user , i dont know what to do. Please help me how to get the activation code for the new user.
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adam Reply:
August 18th, 2011 at 3:51 pm
it has happened to me the same
I dont know what to do
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It is ridiculous that a person who coincidentally has the same name as one who was banned cannot create an account just because of this matching information.
That is pitiful, and we users should do something.
They’re too strict and want us to talk like robots, no casual conversation, simply nothing, only things regarding language learning.
THIS IS BORING. Nobody wants to learn languages this way.
Bunch of retards, I mean, ST and its moderators.
I suppose we should do something to get their attention so that they can see a lot of people aren’t satisfied with this irrelevant way of treating.
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adam Reply:
August 18th, 2011 at 3:49 pm
I got banned from sharedtalk today. I cleared out the historical records and I tried to open a new account many times but it doesnt work. The activiation code does not get to my email yet.
I have tried to open it from different computers
any ideas
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george Reply:
January 24th, 2012 at 8:02 am
it has happened the same to me. I still dont get that damn code of activation
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