Takara Tomy's Kanji no Jikan

Have you seen the Takara Tomy “Kanji no Jikan”?

image

What do you think of it, and how does it work?
It looks like it might just use an Anki-style spaced repetition for vocabulary, without any means to input answers :thinking:

They really took an SRS device and charged $50 for it.

I don’t see anything wrong with that in principle, but 1,200 questions is not good bang for the buck.

Also what’s up with that example… 十姉妹… who is this really meant for? Seems more like it’s the physical representation of a 難読漢字 blog than a study aid.

3 Likes

I do, because it’s a pretty easy thing to make, and I’m sure there are similar products for other languages or subjects that you can get for $5-10.

I guess I can imagine a device that could be worth $50, while maybe other people can’t. This one isn’t worth $50, like I said. (You surely know many people ultimately pay more than $50 for WaniKani, I assume, so maybe I’m just not understanding what you meant).

1 Like

The amount of words, i.e. KBs of data, shouldn’t be the difference between something costing $5 or $10. This isn’t the 90s anymore.

First thing I found online, learning device for English and Spanish with screen and what it says are 104 learning activities, $35.

Can there reasonably be a $50 SRS handheld device? Yes. It would need a lot of features to be worth the price.

Most people don’t pay for the SRS in WaniKani, they pay for the service, the support, the content, etc. Anki is a thing that exists.

I wasn’t imagining only bumping up the word count when I said that, it just stood out as kind of a laughably low non-starter.

At that number of items, it doesn’t matter how many features it has.

Then yes, you were misunderstanding.

When I said SRS device, I meant just that, no extra features, and one that looks like the one in the picture.

We basically established agreement here

Anyway.

I know.

Also at that point just get a cheap phone and use it as an SRS device with some free app.

looks stupid

1 Like

Should’ve just said that, honestly.

Is it actually an SRS, though? The manufacturer’s FAQ says 問題は1200問ランダムでできますが、出題後にボタンを押すとわかった問題として記録し、以後出てこないようにすることができます。 which sounds more like a simple blacklist to me.

This presumably is aiming at the “educational toy” market, so its actual efficacy as a learning device is probably not going to be the primary determiner of sales. Also, it’s hardly surprising that a known Japanese brand is going to charge more than a no-name straight-from-China lowest-possible-price thing from Amazon. You pay more for a better quality of construction, for support/guarantee/returns if you need it, etc.

This specific device doesn’t look great, but I think sometimes special-purpose devices can be better than “another web app on the phone”. I’m much happier with my electronic dictionary than I would be with a mobile phone app.

3 Likes

Don’t give me ideas!

You can even set it on your TV and make it a big anki machine.

This topic was automatically closed 365 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.