Quote Originally Posted by Man About Town View Post
It's nothing but a show-off. Anyone can learn a few phrases, put some effort into practicing a proper accent and you are good to go! There are thousands of polyglots like him on the net flaunting their prodigious flare for languages while in fact, I can bet my bottom dollar on it, they didn't even try to study any of those. Well, maybe they did, but didn't get any further than picking up some basics just sufficient to put on a chip show.
I agree.
The guy obviously has some linguistic talent and loves languages, but I highly doubt he's actually fluent in more than 2-4 of them (in 10-15 years - maybe, but not now). He probably can be considered an intermediate or even an advanced student in some of them, but it's a far cry from being fluent. For example he's made a few serious grammar mistakes in his Russian phrases, and I wonder how many mistakes he would have made in an unscripted or more complex text. On the other hand his pronunciation is very good, the accent is very slight and I'm sure he'll get even better with practice.

It's still inspiring to see a young man who puts his mind to work, and it's something to be proud about. But using false and boastful labels cheapen his achievements a little.