So today I got a lesson for 常, using the mnemonic ‘Joe the farmhand’ (for the sound じょう). This confused me at first, because I’d got used to ‘Jourm the farmhand’.
I looked it up and it seems to be a system-wide update, because it’s also been changed for 上, for example.
But honestly, this was an excellent idea, because it took me forever to remember ‘Jourm’ when I was starting out with WaniKani. It’s quite hard to remember a name that doesn’t even exist.
I’m not sure if ‘Joe’ is the best alternative, but I guess it’s close enough to じょう? In any case, I’d say it’s an improvement!
Interestingly I found the opposite to be true. I remembered it more because it was different. It also seemed to just fit the description of our recently departed friendly and hard working farmhand.
Warning: sarcasm/joke ahead. You have been warned.
WTF. They changed this? They changed something. That is it, WK is unusable for me. They care nothing about their users. Have they no integrity at all? Having to picture Joe as the farmhand is going to throw everything off after months (neigh years) of developing a routine using Jourm. I am outta here.
A few minutes later: Wait, what is this I have found?. A new script: “Replaces all instances of Joe with Jourm” in all lesson and review mnemonic descriptions".
Whew, I can resume my studying again. That was close.
I will say I did get confused at first with it though - I’d never seen the name so I didn’t know how to pronounce it! I do think Joe will be much easier for many people, however there might be an increase of people writing “じょ” instead of “じょう”
To be fair, I just took someone else’s script that replaces text on a website and set the parameters so that it would change Jourm to Joeni but it didn’t always work
Especially give that there is a character “Jo-Anne” already used for じょ. The long name corresponds to the short jo and the short name corresponds to the long jo-o
BTW, no need to worry. Jourm has found a new job/role. He has left the farming life behind and is now in World of Warcraft. He is looking decidedly less friendly however. Jourm - Character
