Just got the email earlier today which read (essentially), "Thank you for building this wonderful and vibrant community...that we're closing."

I didn't use the site enough, partly because it wasn't heavily trafficked, and partly because the UI made it feel like the MySpace of language exchange. However, when I did use it, I appreciated the ability to just jump on and instantly start having a voice conversation with someone, without any need for preamble or advanced scheduling.

What is everyone using these days to spark that kind of spontaneous conversation exchange, if anything?

I'd like to know this as well. I haven't used Shared Talk in a while but 5-6 years ago it helped introduce me to a few Japanese friends, some Chinese, etc. Lately I've been staying away from sites like these because I have no desire to speak with Japanese people who know or want to learn English (it gives me an excuse to revert to English which is a bad habit). Nonetheless I'd like to try and make more friends with whom I can speak with. Going through sites like Japan-Guide, you typically only make LINE buddies and never voice chat. Maybe just my personal experience, but that's what's happened for me.

TheVinster Wrote:I'd like to know this as well. I haven't used Shared Talk in a while but 5-6 years ago it helped introduce me to a few Japanese friends, some Chinese, etc. Lately I've been staying away from sites like these because I have no desire to speak with Japanese people who know or want to learn English (it gives me an excuse to revert to English which is a bad habit). Nonetheless I'd like to try and make more friends with whom I can speak with. Going through sites like Japan-Guide, you typically only make LINE buddies and never voice chat. Maybe just my personal experience, but that's what's happened for me.

I had two extensive conversations and met two people face to face via Japan-Guide - one of whom is my bride-to-be. Beyond that, I'd generally agree that Japan-Guide hasn't been great for making voice chat pals. I've had the same experience with the HelloTalk app - lots of text, little voice convo.

I've had more luck with ConversationExchange.com, particularly with contacting folks who live in Japan and who speak scant English.

I found Speaky (gospeaky.com) today, and am trying that out. It's a well designed site. They have a Live Chat feature that lets you initiate voice convos with others who are online. They also let you toggle whether you want to speak to only native speakers of Japanese or natives + non-natives. Unfortunately, there seem to be few native Japanese speakers available.

gaiaslastlaugh Wrote:I had two extensive conversations and met two people face to face via Japan-Guide - one of whom is my bride-to-be.

Congratulations

Awww. I haven't used it in years, but I used it a bit when I first came to Japan. I met a girl from Tokyo on it and we had a friends-with-benefits relationship for a while there, haha. So thanks for getting me laid, SharedTalk.

Not quite the same thing, but is there anything like chatroulette and the like that's more Japan based rather than European/American? (Usual caveats apply when using these sorts of things)

Darn, I liked that site!
As for chatroulette chatpad.jp is like a text-only version of chatroulette.

I used to use スカイプちゃんねる and sites like that where Japanese people look for people to chat with on skype. You can write in your description that you just wanna have a nice chat, or you're looking for friends, or that you wanna talk about certain hobbies/interests, etc. I would never mention language exchange in my description; sometimes I would say イギリス人 to get more people interested but sometimes just pretend to be Japanese. Anyway, that's one option for you; forget language exchange sites and use the sites the Japanese use for finding people to chat with. You can definitely make some lasting friendships doing this too

Aww that's sad. I don't use it anymore in favor of the Japanese-Only skype sites, but it was a real help in my early days of language learning.

Semi-related, have any of you used the Saitou-san app and would care to share your experiences? From what I've read it seems to be something along the lines of what @Woodgar is looking for.

You guys might be interested in this site that's in construction to replace shared talk:
http://www.quora.com/Why-is-Sharedtalk-closing-down
It's being built by the original creator of shared talk.

another website kind of exchange language: https://exchangelanguages.com/

Are there any other websites similar to sharedtalk?

I use https://sharedlingo.com/ occasionally. Pretty much like sharedtalk