I kind of want to see Tofugu’s new Textfugu revamp into whatever it becomes to compare.
My having purchased a lifetime Textfugu membership awhile back may have something to do with that though.
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I am starting to lean towards getting it, I think. Since it includes a download of all Nihongoshark content, I could get some use out of it right away, even though they won’t have anything for my level for a good while. It’s also interesting that they intend to have a lot of content past N1, which could be really handy.
Anyway, someone put together an unofficial FAQ
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1f2PvMJILagdukbJx8TY_h_1WTZAcSM0gxr_Cwwj5Cv8/edit
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Wow. I just finished reading all the replies and I just decided that I won’t be purchasing the lifetime access.
Reasons:
- I don’t have that much money right now, if I’m gonna purchase it, I have to sacrifice a lot of things (which I guess is a pretty solid reason since I won’t be getting the learning materials on NativShark any time soon but I for sure need to eat every day)
- There are a lot more free and better or at least on par Japanese learning resources out there. I just have to look harder.
- I’m not sure I can really allocate an hour or two to study by myself. I just don’t have the willpower and accountability to do it, which is why I have always been in a Japanese course with actual teachers teaching me stuff about grammar points in a certain allocated time each day. Because otherwise I would make excuses and not prioritize my Japanese study due to college etc. It’s pretty cheap, too, for a 1-on-1 45-min lesson with a Japanese teacher (although not native). It’s only about $3 each session, I guess?
Whew. I’m so glad I stumbled upon this discussion. It definitely just saved me a ton of money.
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I’m also leaning towards it but really only for the grammar.
I’m still just not convinced it’s the best investment, especially when something like BunPro is only $3 a month…
Between BunPro, the DOBJG, and various other Japanese resources online, I’m thinking I could cobble together a quality grammar education that would be much cheaper than NativShark. What are your (or anyone else’s) thoughts on this cobbled together approach?
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Just my 2 cents after following this, it seems since they have no content in their new system, they will take a long time (years?) to get far in or finish. In a year or years with the same money I would prefer to get to the levels they are advertising using proven materials such as textbooks, reading, and WaniKani… I understand that for the $250 they offer their old material but why are they going through a complete revamp if that material was great anyways? I would spend that money on the textbooks, books, and WK/Bunpro/etc subscriptions rather than upfront for promises of future content.
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I get where you’re coming from and frankly I think I agree. That being said, according to them (again, having to take their word for it), more than 75% of their content is done and they plan to launch the first batch of 150+ lessons in March.
They’re promising all of the content rolled out by the end of the year (I would certainly take much longer to even get through the first section.)
https://www.nativshark.com/roadmap
Do you think this lends them credibility?
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Has it become old-fashioned to advertise and charge for your product after it is actually finished?
I’d definitely hold off with any purchase until I could actually get more than just the promise that it’ll one day exist and be as awesome as you won’t beleive how awesome
At this point why don’t you just use the money on an etoeto subscription instead 
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Would that I could…
Although it seems interesting, I will skip it for now. I wouldn’t really be interested in any material prior N1 anyway, so there is really no point in paying for something a year prior I could even access it.
I’m also really against any early access/preorder business as well. Seen it enough with games and been burnt out on that enough. If reviews after release are good enough and I still see a use for the material a year later or whenever the release the specialiced after N1 material… maybe I’ll consider again.
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A lot of people are commenting on how they have no content yet, and that’s mostly true (they have kana lessons and some lessons on basic travel phrases up right now, plus the download of the old content if you buy lifetime). I did want to show though that they at least have a plan. It’s not as good as actual content but it at least makes me slightly more confident than a “coming soon” note. Here’s a screenshot of the first section of phase one…
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- Pricing model is suspect (and almost dark UX considering it’s not a complete tool yet). Enter at your own risk.
- If the tool is designed like the website it doesn’t fill me with confidence
- Don’t we all have textbooks that cover this stuff anyway? Remembering sentence structures and what not is not as taxing as remembering how to read the kanji, which is why we’re all here.
I’m not attached to any one method of learning, I just think you might be better using your time watching Japanese Netflix or playing a computer game in Japanese than whatever this seems to be, considering the price.
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Haven’t heard of this before now. Looks, interesting, but I’m going to continue with WaniKani and Satori Reader. These are pretty effective for me for JLPT practice, right now.
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I wasn’t really trying to argue for or against them. I just wanted to show what was actually there. You’re right though, so far I haven’t seen anything that isn’t covered in a textbook or wanikani or another such established website.
I’m glad you did, was certainly worth a look and it’s been interesting to see what others think. Just wanted to drop my own 2 cents!
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Hmm I was very tempted Yesterday but I think I’ll go with my current plan instead: Wanikani, Kaniwani, finishing my shadowing books, reading stories, playing video games, some Bunpro. Ah, and I already have a core 5k and 10k anki deck with audio so… meh. I’ll pass. I rather use any extra money on a tutor. Other than Bunpro and a tutor I’m not spending more on Japanese.
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I mean of course it’s a bit better, but it still just tells me that May 2020 is the earliest they should start charging money based on these features, not now.
Oh, and BTW this is such a coincidence, but I had this dream last night about a machine that would download an entire language into the living tissue of your brain, so I’m gonna start building that!
Assuming everything goes the way I dreamed it, there should be a working prototype in May 2020 also! But In the meantime, why don’t you buy a lifetime subscription? You can have some of my Anki flashcards to hold you off, they’re super neat!
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I’ve come to the same conclusion as you. There’s plenty else out there that exists right now and isn’t charging $250. Thanks but no thanks NativShark (maybe in the future it’ll be super awesome but at the moment it doesn’t exist!)
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Yea I’m on the Genki 1 + 2 path right now, but I use Bunpro ontop of it to reinforce my grammar and get it in SRS format.
Have you used Genki? My plan after is to go through A dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammer, which is supposed to be a good resource.
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There are more than that.
“Remember the Kanji” or “RTK” Anki deck claims that you can travel through 2000 kanji in 100 days. But only the meaning. 20 a day sums up to 2000 and then you have a bit of repetition time at the end.
I did a couple of hundred in the RTK deck, but I soon found out that I lacked the pronouncination. WK might be slower but teaches much more in my opinion.
(I tend to forget them here too, but someone said that forgetting kanji is quite normal…)
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I also think it’s important to separate short term and long term memory here… Like, how much do you remember a month down the line? A year? Five years?
I forget the odd WK kanji relatively often, but when it’s just the odd kanji and only every other day, it’s at least no biggie to look up (it’s mostly my ego that takes a hit… like “I levelled up to 60, I should know this stuff!”)
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