Thanks? You know, I'm still not really clear what trolling is.  If someone innocently triggers a flame war, is that also trolling? Or does it require malicious intent? Or how about if someone is not trying to incite a stong response just for kicks, but genuinely wants people to be aware of something...and possibly effect positive change. Is that trolling? If so, then yeah, I guess I'm a troll.  :-)

*            *            *            *            *              *

My post, in case it's not obvious, is AJATT's latest Silverspoon scheme. Prices are up: now $2- $5 per day. [Refundable only after 18 months.] He clearly assumes his followers are idiots. He has now opened up his Silverspoon service to unlimited numbers (so I guess the Q&A sessions didn't involve the overwhelming amount of work his followers imagined he was generously bestowing on them.)

My only comfort is that the youngsters (who I fear might be more likely to fall for this wannabe internet huckster) probably won't have the money. (Then again, it was adults who purchased pet insurance before the most recent End of the World...)

Folks, the time has come for some guru follower civil disobedience. AJATTeers need to boycott this nonsense and send AJATT the message that it needs to rethink its business practices. AJATTeers deserve better indeed.  If I had noticed his bizarre new terms earlier, I would've begged all you smart and connected folks to spread the word to your AJATTeer friends. It might be too late ....at least for this round. [edit: the Aug 1, 24-hr sales opening using this new 18-month refund.]

So ... AJATT can process daily $5/day receipts, but claims that it can only handle refunds every 18 months. Is that someone they want to do business with? If they're grateful for his self-help/language blog, they can send him a donation. But they shouldn't let any guru stuff cloud their internet purchasing sense.

We can identify many problems with AJATT, and Silverspoon's marketing and terms of sale. I'm tempted to go through them one by one. But where? (Sorry to use your site Fabrice.) Is it even necessary?  I want to believe that many of the commenters over at AJATT are not representative of some larger group. I want to believe that no one will agree to this. Will they?

AJATT's gone too far. He was a fairly benign blogger, but now he has entered sleazy unethical business territory.  All the tired anti-marketing marketing schtick is really disappointing.  If people care about AJATT, I feel they should help him make better long term decisions by giving him feedback. How about that?

And btw, I'm pro business and pro profit.  (If you still think it's a good idea to give $1000-2000 to someone on the internet for 18 months, I'll give you my account number. I can make you more fluent than AJATT can...guaranteed!)  ;-)

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Last edited by Thora (2011 August 13, 5:42 pm)

Tzadeck wrote:

Well, for one, people on this forum could stop treating him like he knows what he's talking about.

Or, almost any veteran here could make a blog much better than his mediocre crap.

His Japanese is demonstrably better than pretty much anyone on this forum; I'd say he knows what he's talking about.

I applaud the guy for having the ambition to try to make money out of what he does. He can speak good Japanese, and makes money off the Internet. You're complaining about it on a forum. Who's the winner here?

fakewookie wrote:

Tzadeck wrote:

Well, for one, people on this forum could stop treating him like he knows what he's talking about.

Or, almost any veteran here could make a blog much better than his mediocre crap.

His Japanese is demonstrably better than pretty much anyone on this forum; I'd say he knows what he's talking about.

Having good Japanese doesn't mean you are good at teaching (I don't know whether this guy actually does).

His business practices sound mighty sketchy to me. I gather his product is basically recommendations of what to watch/read. I decide what to look at on my own for free, thanks.

Last edited by Amset (2011 August 01, 12:52 am)

Tzadeck wrote:

Oh, and I'm the winner, because I'm not taking a lot of money from people for a subpar service.

Can you save us some time and just list your reasons why you think it's a subpar product? In easy to read bullet points plz.

60 bucks a month is about what I pay to meet a Japanese tutor four times a month for an hour each lesson, which means it's four hours of face-to-face time plus the time she spends preparing for lessons.  I'd say that's a hell of a lot more than what Khatz is doing for individual SilverSpoon members.  So for two bucks a day you can get really good service.

The reason the service is subpar is really just that Khatz is an idiot.  He makes up stuff, doesn't really put in any effort to determine whether or not it is true, and then recommends it.

You can learn anything, incidentally, if you put enough time into it.  I've learned enough instruments over the years to know a bit about this.  I'm best at guitar even though I never really had any instruction just because I've toughed it out since I was 13, without ever stopping.  But the first two years I did piano lessons, with a very good teacher, my improvement was through the roof compared to anything that ever happened to me with the guitar.  And then when I moved I had some mediocre teachers and my piano playing wasn't improving so much.  My first teacher knew what he was doing, was very structured, and could pinpoint what I needed to do and give me advice.  He actually knew what he was talking about, unlike my other teachers.

So, I admit, AJATT will work for you eventually, because any method will.  Just like how I learned guitar.  The interesting question for language learners is which methods work better, not which methods work.  They all will work eventually.  Khatz' method is, in my opinion, one that just works because people put the hours in.

The reason I assume that Khatz' method has nothing special about it is because a lot of what he has written is obviously untrue, is misleading, or is just loopy.

I also think he hasn't put in a lot of actual work to help the Japanese learning community.  It doesn't even sound like he reads over what he wrote, and he hasn't actually made any real learning materials.  Fabrice, on the other hand, has made a very good and helpful website that actually does something.  Or, the people who made books like the Dictionary of Japanese Grammar--there are some people who have put in a lot of work to make a good product.  If you have 60 bucks a month to give to people, why not donate to Fabrice, or the Anki website, or the people who wrote those dictionaries?

fakewookie wrote:

Tzadeck wrote:

Well, for one, people on this forum could stop treating him like he knows what he's talking about.

Or, almost any veteran here could make a blog much better than his mediocre crap.

His Japanese is demonstrably better than pretty much anyone on this forum; I'd say he knows what he's talking about.

I applaud the guy for having the ambition to try to make money out of what he does. He can speak good Japanese, and makes money off the Internet. You're complaining about it on a forum. Who's the winner here?

Could you post a link to a YouTube video actually demonstrating this? I too, was won over by AJATT but I tried in vain to find a video of him actually speaking in passable Japanese. There's a video of him in a sushi restaurant with a horribly annoying 1/4 Japanese American guy where they just talk in English about how foreigners complain too much about Japan, and a video of him watching Dragonball Z in Cantonese, but I'll be damned if I've ever SEEN Khatzumoto speak in Japanese.

Just because he types regularly in Japanese and uses kanji where Japanese natives don't, does not mean he is fluent in Japanese.

fakewookie wrote:

Tzadeck wrote:

60 bucks a month is about what I pay to meet a Japanese tutor four times a month for an hour each lesson, which means it's four hours of face-to-face time plus the time she spends preparing for lessons.  I'd say that's a hell of a lot more than what Khatz is doing for individual SilverSpoon members.  So for two bucks a day you can get really good service.

Why would you pay $60 a month for a Japanese tutor when according to your profile you live in Japan and therefore should have an abundance of people you can talk to for free?

I don't know if you've actually tried this, but those people you can talk to for free won't correct every little mistake and offer guidance, as the more time you spend with them, the more they'll tire of picking up on your mistakes and just go with it. Same happens the other way around, with English native speakers and foreign learners, of course!
A professional tutor will at least offer guidance continuously and be a lot better for your language study in the long run.

fakewookie wrote:

jasdev wrote:

Could you post a link to a YouTube video actually demonstrating this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejRkuX1RGf4

Thanks for this! I concur, on first impressions his Japanese is good, but better than anyone on this forum? That's a little extreme. He's certainly better than I am, though ;-)

Just caught your edit - that doesn't matter. He began learning in 2004 (in my recollection) and claims to have become fluent in 18 months, and that's what he's selling on his website. Not saying he's not good, just saying take him with a pinch of salt.

There was a video of him speaking somewhere. It sounded like he rehearsed it and there were frequent mistakes in word usage etc.

It wasn't bad per se, but no better than anyone else I know who has been somewhat dedicated for a couple years and has some Japanese friends.

I think it's funny that he wants people to throw money at him when he has really provided almost nothing of value (actual resources), just lots of speculative ideas in really bad writing combined with a small amount of useful advice that borders on common sense.

If you have money to burn, donate to Damien. Anki has done way more for everyone than Khatz ever has/will.

Last edited by Jarvik7 (2011 August 01, 2:42 am)

@Thora

Perhaps you can start a blog and collect negative reviews of AJATT's sleazy commercial aspects. ;p

His scam/system seems designed for short-term glowing testimonials from fellow language bloggers.

The Khatz as guru thing is strong here as a residue of years past when AJATT was relevant (and even the oldest, most inferior and outdated sites remain relevant to beginners who stumble across them, it's the nature of the Web to preserve them), so I think threads here will only spin in endless circles as the same nonsense defenses get torn apart and then recycled.

This forum is light years ahead of other sites when it comes to tools and strategies and advice, it would probably be better to spend time making it more approachable than repeating those anti-AJATT threads, especially I think guru bloggers will lose their legs as communities like this become more accessible to the leech types who need to be spoonfed, if you actually want to bother saving them from getting suckered out of their money.

jasdev wrote:

Just caught your edit - that doesn't matter. He began learning in 2004 (in my recollection) and claims to have become fluent in 18 months, and that's what he's selling on his website. Not saying he's not good, just saying take him with a pinch of salt.

I have come across various systems to learn Japanese that are similar to that claim. Some even covering only a minor aspect of Japanese. So, there is nothing unique with AJATT in that respect.

tnall wrote:

so save your anger and passion for something that does matter to you. It'd be a better use of your energy, でしょ? o_O

I'm bored at work and have nothing better to do.

nest0r wrote:

@Thora

Perhaps you can start a blog and collect negative reviews of AJATT's sleazy commercial aspects. ;p

His scam/system seems designed for short-term glowing testimonials from fellow language bloggers.

The Khatz as guru thing is strong here as a residue of years past when AJATT was relevant (and even the oldest, most inferior and outdated sites remain relevant to beginners who stumble across them, it's the nature of the Web to preserve them), so I think threads here will only spin in endless circles as the same nonsense defenses get torn apart and then recycled.

This forum is light years ahead of other sites when it comes to tools and strategies and advice, it would probably be better to spend time making it more approachable than repeating those anti-AJATT threads, especially I think guru bloggers will lose their legs as communities like this become more accessible to the leech types who need to be spoonfed, if you actually want to bother saving them from getting suckered out of their money.

There is a precedent for this. Anyone here heard of Robert Toru Kiyosaki, of Rich Dad Poor Dad fame? A Florida real estate millionaire by the name of John T Reed has an extremely thorough debunking of everything Kiyosaki. Now, if you search in Google for Rich Dad Poor Dad, his page comes up fifth! And Kiyosaki is definitely someone who has made a lot of money off regular people by selling them snake oil, so if someone genuinely believes Khatzumoto is up to the same thing, there's nothing to stop them making a site!