Welcome to a new episode of "Detective Dan!"
Previously, I exposed some less-than-ethical behavior on the part of the center Elight,
and this time, I'm going to expose a center that's even more deserving,
none other than . . .
Yeah, Langmaster Learning System.
If you're not aware of Langmaster, it's a chain of English centers here in Hanoi,
with 10 centers around the city,
and a very powerful marketing team.
Also, they're a center that specializes in plagiarism.
They've plagiarized from BBC Learning English,
the International University of Japan,
AJ Hoge, and a lot of other sources, too.
I've known about Langmaster for a number of years,
and recently I read some negative comments about them,
so I decided to investigate them for myself.
The first noteworthy thing about Langmaster is all the reviews on their Facebook page.
There are loads of 5-star reviews,
but the majority have no content or comments whatsoever.
People are just clicking "5-stars" and leaving.
And a lot of other 5-star reviews appear to just be advertisements for courses at Langmaster.
However, when you look at the 1-star reviews, the content tends to be more explicit.
"Fraud page! All the content is taken from other places."
"Specialists in stealing the intellectual property of test-prep teachers and college lecturers,
then putting their logo on it like it's actually theirs."
"Can't comment on the quality. But don't go stealing other people's work so blatantly."
Almost as if the 5-star reviews are all fake, and only the 1-star reviews are genuine.
Interesting, huh?
And Langmaster's videos on YouTube are really interesting, too.
Their channel currently has almost 1,500 videos,
and for a huge number of them, they just plagiarized the content.
One of their favorite sources is BBC Learning English.
For example, read this passage below, and watch Langmaster's video up above.
And this text, too. Langmaster copied it word for word.
I found 18 videos they plagiarized from the BBC,
and of course they didn't bother to list the source.
And I found three more videos that they plagiarized from the International University of Japan.
For example, in this video she's going to read the introduction to a course there.
Uh, wait a sec. What's "OCSALS?"
According to my research, it's a course at that university which includes . . .
Oh my god!
They even used the name of the university!
If you're going to plagiarize, you at least need to be smart about how you do it!
Those were just a few examples of Langmaster's plagiarism.
After a period of research that wasn't really that long, I found 100 Langmaster videos with plagiarized content.
That number doesn't mean that Langmaster only plagiarized 100 times.
It's just that after I found 100 cases, I quit looking,
because I felt that number was enough to prove that for Langmaster, plagiarism is par for the course.
Just like I did with Elight's book before,
I collected all the examples of plagiarism into a spreadsheet.
I've included a public link in the description.
And I want to mention here that I think the people who've appeared in Langmaster's videos may be innocent.
I'm guessing that Langmaster just hired them, gave them a script, and told them to read it,
not that these guys took it upon themselves to commit plagiarism.
However, I still feel that they were irresponsible and lacking in judgment if they didn't have any suspicions
about the source of the content in all of those videos.
This girl, in particular.
She's appeared in hundreds of Langmaster videos,
many of them with content that absolutely reeks of plagiarism.
Did she actually think that Langmaster staff had written all of that themselves?
Or did she just not care?
At this point many of you might be thinking:
"Eh, they're just free videos on YouTube. No big deal."
I disagree.
All those videos, after all, are a marketing tool.
The put their logo in every video,
in the description, they guide viewers to their website,
and at the end of the video, they always say:
In short, a major purpose of those videos is to get new students.
And if Langmaster manages to get any,
then they're making a living off of other people's work.
And if you still think Langmaster's plagiarism isn't a big deal, or it's not worth mentioning,
then why don't you get in touch with the people from whom Langmaster plagiarized?
Like the BBC, for example?
Get in touch with the people who put their time and energy
into researching and writing those lessons themselves,
and tell them:
"It's no big deal! There's nothing wrong with it."
I think they won't agree with your perspective.
Langmaster's dirty deeds aren't just on YouTube, though.
Perhaps many of you know of Langmaster as a center that is in cooperation with AJ Hoge,
the founder of the Effortless English program.
On Langmaster's website, AJ is listed on their "experts" page,
while here, the founder of Langmaster, Tony Dzung, appears in a photo with AJ,
and on Langmaster's YouTube channel, there are a number of videos with AJ.
But now let's see what AJ had to say about Langmaster a few years ago.
Oh, that's not good.
Uh, what company, AJ?
One more time.
Ok, continue.
Oh, that's interesting!
On Langmaster's site, they've got an article called "68 reasons to study English at Langmaster,"
and reason number one is:
"We're the exclusive provider of the Effortless English training method in Vietnam."
exclusive
If AJ's story is the truth,
then what Langmaster is doing isn't just plagiarism, but theft.
And it's not just AJ.
On Langmaster's "experts" page, you'll also find Paul Gruber,
the founder of the Pronunciation Workshop program.
However, about six months ago, Paul put out this message.
He's working exclusively with another center,
and Langmaster is using his name to assert that:
"We're the organization with the world's leading team of methodology experts."
And here . . .
"Come to Langmaster! You'll meet and be trained in English and personal psychology in person by AJ Hoge, Mr. Vas, Paul Gruber, and Jack Canfield."
They're lying through their teeth.
So, what's the conclusion?
I can't judge Langmaster as a whole.
I don't know what their teachers are like.
I also don't know what their courses are like.
They may have helped a lot of Vietnamese people learn English.
However, committing plagiarism and, especially, using people's names and lessons without their agreement
are totally inappropriate for a serious, professional center.
So, I think this will be a test for Langmaster.
If they're a serious center, they'll come out and explicitly admit what they've done,
they'll take down all of the videos with plagiarized content,
or at least cite the source,
and they'll stop using the names and intellectual property of AJ Hoge and Paul Gruber.
In short, they'll try to fix their mistakes.
And if they don't do those things,
if they keep silent or if they come after me personally . . .
then you guys will know what kind of educational organization they are.
And I've got one more thing to say now.
You guys already know I'm not the type of YouTuber who's in the habit of saying:
"IF YOU LIKED THIS VIDEO, REMEMBER TO LIKE, SHARE, AND SUBSCRIBE!"
I don't like that.
But this is an exception.
If you're a person who cares about justice,
if you're a person who wants Vietnam to have an honest and professional environment for studying English,
then please share this video.
Or, you don't necessarily need to share my video.
You could share AJ's video instead.
One way or another, please share the truth about Langmaster's unprofessional behavior,
so that they can't just keep silent, not fix anything, and not suffer any consequences.
There's one more thing.
I researched this video with help from the channel MyFirstStep.
He's also just made a video about Langmaster. You can watch it here.