As far as I know the core2k/6k decks are from KO2001 and are unrelated to the "core" Japanese courses from iKnow! that go to 6,000, right? Then again I'm sure a lot or most of the content is from KO2001 anyways - I've been trying to find out more about them and I read about how iKnow kind of screwed over their users when they went to a paid model.... The reason I'm asking is because I recently finished RTK3 and I'm currently working through Tae Kim's with plans of finishing somewhere near the end of the month, but I'm unsure of which to start with between the two after I'm done.

I'm leaning towards a 6 month plan on iKnow mainly based on the great audio the site offers alongside the lessons - I tried the free one and was impressed with the voice acting. The money isn't an issue for me, and I want to focus on listening comprehension alongside what I'm reading right now to help start a good foundation, but then again I don't know much about the core decks (as you can probably guess from the very first sentence), and I'm a little hesitant to pay into a company that's treated it's members poorly in the past. On the other hand though, I care more about the quality of my learning as a whole and it would probably be easier for me to follow a structured system like a lesson plan-type thing, but it seems like any posts I can find on the subject are from before the split, so I'm curious if anyone here still uses it, or did after the change, and your thoughts?

I try not to spend too much time lurking the forums, and it seems like pretty much everyone uses the core decks from what I gather, so maybe this is a stupid question (and if so I apologize), but I would appreciate any opinions or suggestions on the matter. Thanks in advance!

I haven't tried Iknow but the Core2k/6k decks with sentence/listening/kanji/word are extremely good. Unless you have plans learning words for a specific area I would recommend Core2k/6k.

HolyKotor Wrote:As far as I know the core2k/6k decks are from KO2001 and are unrelated to the "core" Japanese courses from iKnow! that go to 6,000, right? Then again I'm sure a lot or most of the content is from KO2001 anyways - I've been trying to find out more about them and I read about how iKnow kind of screwed over their users when they went to a paid model....

The core2k/6k decks ARE an old version from iknow. Audio, sentences, translations, pictures were all ripped from the site and made into Anki decks.

I believe smart.fm has now re-made its Japanese course with new sentences and audio, so it doesn't match whats up there now. Also I personally really liked smart.fm, and found it great for learning vocab when I was a total beginner; something i found impossible with just anki. So still worth signing up now it's gone paid.

Yep as said ^ the core 2k / 6k decks are the old iknow.

Whether it's worth the money depends on how you learn and how much money you have to spare...

[Zgarbas]

It's almost exactly the same content, and the audio was ripped and can be found on the internet for the anki decks.

Personally I prefer Iknow since i can't learn on anki no matter how hard I try... most people on this forum don't have this issue though. I'd try anki, see if it works, and switch to Iknow if it doesn't. I like to mix.

imho Iknow is more friendly and better for learning, but anki is better for long-term reviews.

Core6k is from iKnow. Kore6k is iKnow's stuff rearranged into a different order, supposedly optimized for learning.

I use iKnow daily and find it to be great. It's been well worth the money.

Zgarbas Wrote:It's almost exactly the same content, and the audio was ripped and can be found on the internet for the anki decks.

Man, how I would love a link to that if it were true - the audio is pretty much the biggest factor to me. Searching around for a little while though, I found this discussion: http://learnjapanesepod.com/forums/anki-...ow/5/?wap2 and it brings up an interesting point; I don't know how much time that person spends per day studying, but I can see how the interface could clutter and slow you down vs the anki interface, which would be a big no-no for me since I want to get through it as quickly as possible.

wccrawford Wrote:Core6k is from iKnow. Kore6k is iKnow's stuff rearranged into a different order, supposedly optimized for learning.

Do they have the audio and/or pictures as well, or do you have to add those separately? Honestly if I could find this for anki I would definitely do it - I've noticed for some reason it seems easier and more fun to review on my desktop in anki than in a web browser.

Also, can the Core6k/Kore6k decks with stuff from iKnow be found in shared decks on anki? Because all of the core decks I find on there were last modified 350-700 days ago and say smart.fm in the descriptions, making me think they're kind of outdated.

[Zgarbas]

Iknow isn't THAT much different from smart.fm content-wise, so you can use the ones on shared decks freely. The differences are minor and neglectable, and the sentences are for the most part the same.

Like I said, if you can learn with anki then don't bother with Iknow. For a slow learner such as myself Iknow works best.

P.S. I do almost 1000/month at a not-so-steady 6h-per-week pace. Not sure if as a beginner you could go that fast, but still. It's about how much time you are willing to invest in it... imho just 200 per month is way too low though... The hardest courses I had (meaning they had terms that I was completely unfamiliar with and were pretty sucky/put similar terms together to confuse me/had political terms) took about 2:30h cumulative to finish, and the easiest took about an hour. Let's say that a complete beginner takes just a bit longer than my hardest, and go for 3 hours/course. To "only" get 200 items per month would be less than a 15 minutes/day investment...

The content is mostly the same. Some words/sentences have been added and some removed, but most of the change they did was reordering them and changing some of the definitions to make them clearer. I think the new order is an improvement, but if you're happy learning with Anki then the reordering alone isn't likely to be worth paying for.

I'm another of those that learns new vocab more easily with the iKnow software (which has improved since the old smart.fm in my opinion) than with Anki though. So for me I consider the overall package to be worth the money I've spent on it. I know others find Anki alone to be fine.

I aim for 20 new words a day on iKnow (varies between 15 and 20) and don't find it takes very long personally.

[Katsuo]

HolyKotor Wrote:Also, can the Core6k/Kore6k decks with stuff from iKnow be found in shared decks on anki? Because all of the core decks I find on there were last modified 350-700 days ago and say smart.fm in the descriptions, making me think they're kind of outdated.

The Anki shared decks include one called "corePLUS". This has the Core text and a lot more besides (the bits you don't need could be stripped out). The audio and image files are not included but there is information about where to get them (i.e. this post). The image files appear to be on a file-sharing service that has recently closed down, so they may be harder to find.

Katsuo Wrote:The Anki shared decks include one called "corePLUS". This has the Core text and a lot more besides (the bits you don't need could be stripped out). The audio and image files are not included but there is information about where to get them (i.e. this post). The image files appear to be on a file-sharing service that has recently closed down, so they may be harder to find.

Ah, awesome! I checked these out and the audio is definitely good. One thing though, does anyone know where my decks ".media" folder is to extract the sound files to? In my C:\Program Files\Anki folder I only see folders called kakasi, locale, mecab, mpl-data, qt4_plugins, and support. I've looked through all of them and nothing looks like a deck folder. Am I missing something obvious here?

Its in "My Documents/Anki"

blackbrich Wrote:Its in "My Documents/Anki"

Hmm, I'm having trouble figuring out how to play the audio now. The folder just had the .anki file, so I made a .media folder and extracted both the folders and tried having the .anki file in the same location, but it won't play for the sentences. Is there a way to direct anki to where they are?

[Zgarbas]

Copy the exact name of the anki file, the folder should be called "name.media". That should do it =).

Zgarbas Wrote:Copy the exact name of the anki file, the folder should be called "name.media". That should do it =).

Ack, I'm dumb, it's working now! Thanks for everyone's input and support - I feel lucky to be included in such an awesome community full of great people! And I gotta say, this deck is pretty snazzy.