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Articles : November, 2009

Surusu Update: Autofeed Cards

While Surusu’s automated card rescheduling and salami-slicing (essentially, showing you only N number of cards at a time) is one of its strengths, sometimes you do want to do a ton of reps uninterrupted.

So, by popular demand, I have added a new feauture dubbed “autofeed cards”. Basically it causes Surusu to keep “feeding” you cards without your constant intervention (no being taken back to the home screen every N cards). Rather like a, uh, an automatic firearm. There’s a friendly image for you ;) .

And that’s it for now! Thanks for using Surusu!

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Thank you to everyone who's donated to AJATT in the past. I know it wasn't easy suddenly becoming so thin and pretty. Thank you.

Original AJATT Products

Read on:
  • Surusu Update: Decks! et alia
  • Surusu Update: Daily Repetition
  • Surusu Update: Rep speed up, Import items fix, Saving “Retain data”
  • Surusu Update: Anki Card/Deck Import; Rep Undo; Deck Ops
  • Surusu Update: Deck Rename!
  • Surusu: Update and Announcement, Or “When Backups Back Up”
  • KhatzuMemo Update: Reset Password, View Stats, Inter-Rep 遷ransition
  • Surusu
  • Table of Contents
  • Comments (1)

    AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-11-28

    • SRS: garbage in, garbage out. #
    • Don’t bother arguing: “Better give your path to a dog than be bitten by him in contesting for the right.”
      I said DON’T ARGUE!!! #
    • MAGAZINES: the unsong heroes of language learning materials. The textiness and mini-chunkiness of books meets the image-heaviness of comics. #
    • Pick sentences based on FUN, not usefulness. (Don’t worry: fun and usefulness tend to intersect far more than many grown-ups believe). #
    • Small or nothing. #
    • The best (online) pinyin converter that I currently know of:
      書虫ピンイン(pinyin)サービス http://bit.ly/uj7Jk #
    • Replace the desire to be fluent with the desire to do something small and useful now…that will bring you closer to fluency than you are. #
    • Replace the desire to be good with the desire to improve. #
    • 「一流の人ほど基本を大事にしている」
      伊藤 真 (新書 – Mar 2008) の ‘続ける力―仕事・勉強で成功する王道 (幻冬舎新書)’ を Amazon でチェック! http://bit.ly/5XjOVB #
    • ”We need to teach the highly educated man that it is not a disgrace to fail…failing is one of the greatest arts”
      http://bit.ly/6JGj1C #
    • “The only time you mustn’t fail is the last time you try. ”
      http://bit.ly/86f2hS #
    • When you’re doing Japanese even though you have every excuse in the world NOT to be doing Japanese…that’s when you’re actually AJATTing. #
    • “Regret for wasted time is more wasted time.” – Mason Cooley
      http://twitter.com/quotepage #
    • 「不可能を消去して残った物は、
      仮令信じられなくとも真実だ。」
      クリス・パイン, レナード・ニモイ, ジョン・チョウ,… の ‘スター・トレック スペシャル・コレクターズ・エディション [DVD]‘ を Amazon でチェック! http://bit.ly/82G04Q #
    • The key with reading is to keep moving.
      If you’re not moving…
      You’re kind of not really reading. #
    • I think (probably) it’s better to read a book [fake number alert] 100 times fast than once slowly. #
    • Throwing things away improves our lives because we have reached a point where the cost of keeping them outweighs the benefit. #
    • A bookshelf is to books as the stomach is to food. It’s not actually for storage, but for processing. #
    • Drama recommendation: エリートヤンキー三郎 (Elite Yankee Saburo) — one of the funniest, most OTT shows I’ve seen in a while. 爆笑!
      http://bit.ly/8Naqah #
    • Elite Yankee Saburo: clearly middle-aged men playing high school boys. Lots of subtle political humor, too. Hilarious.
      http://bit.ly/8Naqah #
    • The relationship between spoken Cantonese and standard written Chinese is much closer than many people often assume or give credit… #
    • 駆け込み乗車だけは止めましょう。ね? #
    • 「学生達が血で血を洗い互いの骨を砕き合う戦乱の地、関東・・・・。 」
      http://bit.ly/4pHctd #
    • 「博士も知らないニッポンのウラ」 #
    • 「並不是因爲沒有時間而無法達成成果,而是因爲有時間,所以成果無法達成」
      http://bit.ly/7GB3HP #
    • Delete…delete…delete… #
    • It’s not that you’re tired of Japanese, it’s just that you’re tired of boring crap. #
    • If you never do boring stuff *in* Japanese, then you can never get bored *of* Japanese. #
    • If you can’t concentrate all the way through your timebox, then try shortening it until you basically have to concentrate throughout. #
    • Speaking of timeboxing, check out all these sweet timers (at least one is even waterproof)!
      I use a T-135 right now.
      http://bit.ly/6WMCak #
    • Timeboxing gear: DRETEC’s T-186 is designed specifically for desk/study use. Big LED. Mutable alarm. Looks worth a try.
      http://bit.ly/5hWpmI #
    • 従来のアメリカの子供向けアニメは何処がアホらしいかと言うと、「悪玉の故意犯」論が一般的な所。本物の悪い奴って大抵、敢えて悪い事をしようとしている訳じゃないのが事実だろう。余儀無く無慈悲な手段に訴えるのを強いられていると、本人は思い込んでいるに違いない。詰まる所、善玉気取りなんだ。 #
    • When faced with too many choices, perhaps the key is to realize that the “right” or “perfect” choice is no longer the optimal choice. #
    • When faced with too many choices, a deliberately suboptimal (=imperfect) choice now becomes optimal. #
    • When faced with too many choices, the right choice is not to make the right choice, but to make *a* choice. #
    • 「勉強法の最大のコツは、「頑張らない事」なのです。」
      出典:「脳にいい勉強法」・苫米地英人著
      http://bit.ly/7uWGfg #
    • 「本当の意味で勉強している人で、頑張っている人は居ないのです」
      出典:「脳にいい勉強法」・苫米地英人著
      http://bit.ly/7uWGfg #
    • The AJATT paradox: always improving towards perfection (sorta?), while at the same time always accepting present imperfection as OK. #
    • 「勉強に於いて差別化出来るのは、道具や遣り方です。人間、覚える能力とか意志の力には、そんなに大差は有りません。其処を勘違いして、努力論に走るから、却々続かないのです。」
      無理なく続けられる 年収10倍アップ勉強法
      勝間 和代 (著)
      http://bit.ly/7xGfMZ #
    • 勝間和代先生ってズバリ言うと、日本版兼女性版のブライアン=トレイシーかな。両方とも怒濤の如く誇張した書名を以って、地に足の着いた確りした論調を展開する多作家。ただ勝間の方が、努力論を卒業している点では矢張りトレイシーに勝る気がするけどね。って、いつの間に俺「先生」が口癖に?! #
    • 「怒濤の如く誇張した書名」とは言え、実際に実行すると誇張とは限りないかも知れないよね。ただ一點注意するとしたら、素晴らしい題名を持ったあの一冊だけに全ての望みを託すのが間違いだろう。多読こそ成功への王道・・・とも言えようかって益々オレ団塊世代のオッサンみたいな書き方してる!(笑) #
    • Perhaps the reason people find Noah St. John’s “afformations” so effective is because they bypass “demand resistance”.
      http://bit.ly/6ev3xz #
    • Another benefit of SRSing books: I can read book B that’s critical of book A without fear of losing what was good about book A. #
    • More benefits of SRSing books: I can read book B that’s critical of book A, and see where B is right, but also clearly see where B is wrong. #
    • Don’t judge yourself by the *stock* of Japanese knowledge you have, but by the *flow* of Japanese knowledge you’re placing yourself in. #
    • Have a behavior you need to instill? Try treating yourself like a small child! This worked for my, uh, “friend”: http://bit.ly/8hPyCK #
    • It’s funny how some people can get so vitriolic about PD books (which anyone can choose to ignore), yet accept forced schooling as a normal. #
    • Personal development. PD. Really, it’s just applied psychology (a-la-Martin Seligman) — most of it anyway. #
    • 学習性無力感・・・って・・・言うじゃな~い? http://bit.ly/njzwZ #
    • It’s funny how some people can get so vitriolic about PD books (which anyone can choose to ignore), yet accept forced schooling as normal. #
    • ヤッバイなあ・・・かのセリグマン先生が、どうやら拷問計画の設計に加わったんだって・・・これは事実だったら人の道を踏み外した最悪な展開なんだけど、反面、それだけ心理学のノウハウには力が有るという証拠でもあるよね。恐っろしい。 http://bit.ly/5s43Up #
    • You may often have a voice telling you that you “can’t” or that it’ll “take too long”. At some point, it’s best to just ignore the voice… #
    • Another language-learning paradox: the process is easy, but its effects aren’t instant. Usually “easy” things produce near-instant results. #
    • Another AJATT paradox: delayed fluency (insofar as fluency isn’t instant), but not delayed fun (you can have instant gratification on fun). #
    • If confused, talk or think it out.
      But if you have a clear action to take, stop talking and thinking, and just act. #
    • 「勉強する気になるかどうかは、自分が勉強すればできるようになることを信じられるかどうかにかかっている」
      http://bit.ly/7Ptm41 #
    • 『「型」をしっかり押さえてこそ、自分なりの工夫や文体が生まれる』
      http://bit.ly/5qBkCV #
    • 「[本は]大事な所だけ掬い上げる」
      http://bit.ly/7Gxog5 #
    • 「[あの時こうしていれば良かった]と考えてクヨクヨしても、何の意味も無い」
      http://bit.ly/7rRQFh #
    • “festina lente” #
    • ヤッベぇ!我乍らケロロ軍曹の可愛さに圧倒されてる・・・抵抗せねば・・・ #
    • 「いまどうしてる?」、って立ち入ったこと訊くなよ、ツイターテメエコノヤロー! #
    • “Our brains have evolved to monitor several streams of background information without any foreground cognitive loading.”
      http://bit.ly/pVILX #
    • ツイターの内容を「囀り」じゃなくて「呟き」と訳するらしい・・・と呟いた勝元・・・ #
    • SRS: Sometimes I get carried away and make my cards a little too short, such that they lack context. Those get deleted too. #
    • Deleting bad SRS cards is an expression of trust in your own judgment and discipline. #
    • It’s one thing to say “have fun”, it’s another to actually act on it by removing barriers to fun. #
    • One reason Japanese needs to become part of your identity is because that’s about the only way you’ll willingly do it without supervision. #
    • As you delete SRS items, you are tuning in to your “sweet spot”. The items that remain are the ones you want and need to have right now. #
    • 頑強不屈 :D #
    • Right now, you probably can’t see how you could possibly ever get fluent. That’s normal. You don’t need to see. You just need to do. #
    • Deleting isn’t necessarily a rejection of a sentence’s raw word content, but of its delivery/context/entertainment value: these matter, too. #
    • Surusu: backup in progress #
    • AJATT Blog: intermittent service over the next hour or so… #
    • Maybe it’s good to repeat AD nauseam, but not beyond that. As soon as you actually reach nauseam, it’s time to stop. Otherwise: puking. #
    • Repeat until just before…nauseam… :D ? #
    • This only *sounds* egotistical at first, but…I’ve recently started SRSing my own posts…as well as great comments :D
      http://bit.ly/7OGxvO #
    • The quality of your personal library is not in the raw number of books, but the number of books you *like* (and will actually read)…. #
    • Let E be your library, N its bookcount, and L the number of books you like in E. Then, L^2/N is the “coefficient of library quality” (?) :D #
    • 聰明藥真聰明?
      科學人雜誌網站 http://bit.ly/5MefLA #
    • Coming to the realization that documentaries are by FAR my favorite thing to watch in Cantonese. #
    • Maybe I like documentaries more than movies because movies are all about connotation where documentaries are all about denotation (?) #
    • The process of learning to sing a single song is a microcosm of that of learning an entire language. #
    • I was wrong.
      Babies don’t suck at learning languages.
      YT: http://bit.ly/56FGrG
      They REALLY suck at learning languages.
      Cute kid, tho’ :D . #
    • How long will it take to get fluent? — It’s going to take as long as it’s going to take. And you’ll be there the whole way to see it thru! #
    • How long will it take to get fluent? — Shut up and get back to watching your cartoons! #
    • 「「短い時間の繰り返し[=反復]」が勉強に於ける必勝法」
      Amazon.co.jp: 「本当に頭がよくなる1分間勉強法」: 石井 貴士: 本 http://bit.ly/6rUeki #
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    • Add to favorites
    Thank you to everyone who's donated to AJATT in the past. I know it wasn't easy suddenly becoming so thin and pretty. Thank you.

    Original AJATT Products

    Read on:
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-10-24
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-10-24
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-09-05
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-08-29
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-11-07
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-08-15
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-09-19
  • Twitter Tweets
  • Table of Contents
  • Comments

    The Language Learner’s Prayer

    I know you have kids.
    I know you have a job.
    I know you’re busy.
    I know your friends are making fun of you.
    I know your spouse is giving you funny looks.
    I know people make double-takes when they see you holding a Japanese book.
    I know you live in the boonies and there are no Japanese people around.
    I know you don’t have language midi-chlorians like me and AppleMilk.
    I know. 我知,我知,我知。

    So let me ask you:

    Are you the world’s b***h?

    What are you going to do?
    Is this how you want to play? Does the world own you? Does it have you turning tricks for cigarettes?
    Are you going to keep being the world’s b***h?
    Or are you going to bite its **** [hand?] off, spit it out, wipe the blood off your face (and maybe use some mouthwash…you’re going to want to disinfect things somehow), and start making decisions for yourself?

    …Or are you going to keep being the world’s b***h?
    Because that’s a decision you can make, too.
    You can decide to have the world decide for you — it’ll gladly tell you what to wear, who to be, where to live, how to live, what to put into your mouth, what to put into your mind, what to expect, what not to expect, what to accept, what to believe, what to read, what to watch, what to listen to, when to wake up, when to go to sleep, when and how to use what vehicle to go where it tells you…
    Either way, you decide.
    B***h.

    I’m not saying you should ignore other people and follow my instructions — banana smoothie-guzzling, Japanese-speaking, 26-year-old cat owners probably shouldn’t be high on your list of mentors.
    I’m merely suggesting that you might consider following your own instructions for a change. Whatever those instructions may be. And maybe you can’t change everything overnight, but guess who ultimately suffers most if you continue being a you-know-what for the next 2, 5, 10 and 50 years?

    Don’t you think you deserve better?
    Aren’t you worthy of dignity?
    Isn’t the real improvement of your condition worth the temporary inconvenience of minor pattern disruptions? Especially disruptions to patterns you don’t like that much anyhow?

    Well, that was all very family-friendly.
    I think I’ve been watching far too much Oz

    You know what? I’m sorry. I have no right to talk to you this way. You come here to be inspired, not abused. Let’s put this whole foul-mouthed post behind us, OK? Let’s say a prayer together. Everyone always says AJATT is a cult anyway — let’s prove them right; let’s be spiritual soldiers together.

    Here it is. The Language Learner’s Prayer.

    Oh Richard Dawkins,

    Grant me the serenity to quit whining about not being a child, the courage to show people where they can put it, and the wisdom to know when to ignore them and focus on input, which apparently is most of the time. Because any of that would be better than being the world’s b***h.

    In the name of Karl Popper,

    EOF.

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    Thank you to everyone who's donated to AJATT in the past. I know it wasn't easy suddenly becoming so thin and pretty. Thank you.

    Original AJATT Products

    Read on:
  • For Advertisers
  • Congratulations to Heisig Graduates: You’re The Man Now, Dawg
  • Cute Girls, Mathematics, Language
  • How and What to Read
  • Table of Contents / All Japanese All The Time Dot Com: How to learn Japanese. On your own, having fun and to fluency.
  • How to Score Yourself on Repetitions
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-08-22
  • Mental Tools, The Method
  • Table of Contents
  • Comments (41)

    AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-11-21

    • “Thoughts on SRS content selection…
      1. Be liberal when adding material.
      2. Be liberal when deleting material.”
      http://bit.ly/KYR4s #
    • Are you playing? You’d better be, if you know what’s good for you! #
    • 語学力って、現代の技術では結局、お金ではなく、時間でしか買えないのだ。
      幾ら金払ったって、時間を投資してない限り、「高物買いの銭失い」に成るのが落ち。
      逆に申すと、大したお #
    • LeechBlock for the win! :: Firefox 附加元件 http://bit.ly/3MHNTY #
    • Dreading your SRS reps? That’s a good sign that you’ve gots some deletings to do! LOTS of deleting. #
    • Perhaps the secret to getting good is to enjoy the state of actually learning (decreasing ignorance) more than the state of already knowing. #
    • Look out, sliced bread, here comes…
      Characterizer – Japanese and Chinese 字haracter Reinforcement :: Firefox 附加元件 http://bit.ly/4xNXr1 #
    • Characterizer gems: “刃lade” #
    • 「Yeah!BOY! ライカ フレイバー 皆 独自なプレイヤー」
      http://bit.ly/N2NJP
      http://bit.ly/2DuQBb #
    • The SRS can tell us what we need to review, but not what we need to know. That’s up to us to decide. That’s why we must both delete and add. #
    • SRS is like a calculator in that inputs reflect outputs. If we don’t put fun stuff into the SRS, then SRSing is unlikely to be fun. #
    • You stop sucking. But you never stop learning. #
    • 緊急速報!大発見!林檎芯抜き器は、柿でも効くんだよ!
      実際に柿を食べる事は餘り無いけど・・・ #
    • From @blacktokyo
      マンガで読むニュース 漫画の新聞 http://bit.ly/EGTDz
      v(≧∇≦)v イエイ~! #
    • Struggle may appeal to the would-be tragic heroine inside us, but “short, fun and easy” is the stuff that gets done habitually. #
    • Always attempt in small chunks only. Even when you have a lot of time. Consistent action is not all or nothing; it’s small or nothing. #
    • 「體重指數」。今でも漢字の造語力に感激する。
      http://bit.ly/1KcMPm #
    • Small or nothing. #
    • These beets are fresh!
      YouTube – Luxury ride feat. ZEEBRA PV- Foxxi misQ http://bit.ly/1JprEH #
    • 行き成り大きな事を遣ろうとする(或いは遣れと言われる)と、人間は大体思考も行動も停止して了う。矢張り「スモールオアナシング」にせんと開かん。実行単位を馬鹿馬鹿しいほど小さ #
    • Our opinions about entire peoples generally come down to experiences with one or two individuals, plus some minor-to-specious corroborations #
    • Ah piddy da foo who isn’t reading comics in her target language. #
    • 懐かしいね~Ah piddy da fooって・・・ #
    • NYPD! 逃げる 野郎は パンチで ドツく!! #
    • 戦う価値 無いのだなんて、言わないで呉れ~!
      “Don’t tyeeeell me, it’s naht worth fightin’ fooooooooooooooooooooor” #
    • 知ってんだろ?!俺が遣る事・・・ヲォォオオ 全部お前の為だぞぉぉ “Ya knooww it’s truuu, everythang I dooo…Whooooa…I do it for yeeew!” #
    • Respect Japanese less. Don’t treat it with so much reverence. Think “oh yeah, Japanese…psssh…any hair-dyeing idiot can learn *that*”. #
    • Perhaps “small or nothing” is inapplicable in some situations. But even when doing BIG things, we can only continue over *small* timeframes. #
    • Typically with “small or nothing”, though, both the timeframe and the action are small. Once in a while, for a short time, we do sth. BIG :D #
    • Afraid of deleting your bad SRS items because of all the time invested? Well, how about when the boredom makes you quit your L2 altogether? #
    • 「人と成りしは童のことを捨てたり」ってか俺は全然捨ててないんだけど・・・(^^) #
    • Always do Japanese. Never do boredom. #
    • 「儂」(わし)に漢字が有るなんて知らなかった!しかも田舎者らしく「農」って字が付いていて・・・ピッタリじゃんw。 #
    • 「田舎者らしく」っちゅうより、「田舎者を示唆する」か。
      まいっか。 #
    • The most important quality of an AJATTeer is arrogance. The gall to go against the grain, and even go against going against the grain :) ~ #
    • Idea for limiting less-than-healthy food: limit (timebox) the consumption time rather than the consumption quantity. Same effect, more fun. #
    • Not that I would know… :D #
    • 「規模是前所未見,聞所未聞。」
      美しいね、香港風中国語文体って。
      http://bit.ly/1Lxmqt #
    • 「量の蓄積による質的変化」
      齋藤 孝 (単行本(ソフトカバー) – Aug 21,… の ‘「読む・書く・話す」を一瞬でモノにする技術’ を Amazon でチェック! http://bit.ly/1LBUZz #
    • “A lie told often enough becomes the truth”…Corollary: a truth not told often enough becomes a lie. Or at least gets treated like one. #
    • 野心と自信を同時に持つと初めて成功が生まれるかも知れない。
      野心があるのに自身が無いと、心の穴を埋めるべく、
      衝動買いなど非建設的な行動パターンに陥るだろう。
      そういう意味で #
    • The great thing about the SRS isn’t that it helps me review, but that it allows me to NOT review. It lets me let go, at just the right time. #
    • Thinking: make your SRS reps as easy as possible to do. Win on quantity of cards & reps, and through that produce quality. Also: FUN FUN FUN #
    • Ironically, reducing SRS cards actually *increases* quantity added/reviewed in the long run, since removing duds makes things more fun. #
    • And as we all know: what’s fun, gets done. #
    • Self-fulfilling prophecy: Win before you win so you can win when it’s time to win. #
    • 「十人十色」(ジュウニントイロ)を、
      ずっと「ジュウニンジッショク」と読んでたんだよコンチクショー #
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    Thank you to everyone who's donated to AJATT in the past. I know it wasn't easy suddenly becoming so thin and pretty. Thank you.

    Original AJATT Products

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  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-10-24
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-10-24
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-09-05
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-08-29
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-11-07
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-08-15
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-09-19
  • Twitter Tweets
  • Table of Contents
  • Comments

    Ululation! QRG The Movie Is Here!

    The QRG video has arrived! The QRG video, nicknamed “QRG: The Movie” is a video supplement to the best-selling ebook of similar name — the quick-start, action-oriented, no-nonsense AJATT Quick Reference Guide (QRG).

    As is the custom here at AJATT, let me be the very first to tell you precisely and in no uncertain words:

    Why You Don’t Need The QRG Video And Why You Shouldn’t Buy It

    • No special effects
    • No hot chicks
    • No hot guys
    • No hot anything, really
    • My Mum says I’m handsome, but does that really count?
    • No 3D animation
    • No popcorn
    • In the background, you can still see the tape marks from when I used to try to prevent my cats opening doors (those clever motherlovers…)
    • No batteries included
    • I hadn’t shaved
    • My posture was bad
    • It’s a monologue
    • There’s virtually no Japanese in it.
    • Which is pretty funny for a site called “All Japanese All The Time”.
    • Wanna know what’s even more funny?
    • 日本語を全く解さない癖に一々「アイツのホームページはさぁ、やっぱ日本語足りないんだよね」とかホザいてる馬鹿野郎が
    • That’s what’s freaking funny.
    • 百年早いぞコノヤロー
    • There’s lots of mumbling and rambling. To quote Tolkien verbatim: things were mumbled that shouldn’t have been mumbled.
    • At one point in the video, I inexplicably feel the need to tell you that I read a lot of books — intellectual small man syndrome, hmmm?
    • I have a weird, hard-to-place, mid-Atlanticy accent thing going on that is neither here nor there, and thus, ultimately, hard for everyone to understand.
    • I then take this accent and mumble in it.
    • It’s full of unfunny jokes.
    • That I then laugh at.
    • Yes, I laugh at my own jokes.
    • You could just read the AJATT site.
    • You could just read the QRG ebook.
    • “They” (air quotes) don’t want you to have it.
    • A good number of fellow AJATTeers have put up free AJATT walkthroughs on YouTube. For free. For free, meng.
    • It comes with free membership in the AJATT cult wait…baby steps…baby steps…

    So Who Would Want To Buy The QRG Video?

    • People who bought, enjoyed and benefited from the QRG ebook
    • People who have enjoyed and benefited from previous AJATT videos
    • People who have read, enjoyed and benefited from AJATT articles
    • People looking for a lazy, “hands-free” but action-oriented overview of the AJATT “method”
    • People who prefer verbal explanations.
    • People who prefer watching a video to reading large amounts of text
    • People who want to get right to the AJATT “action” without wading through large amounts of interesting but “less action-oriented” individual.

    The AJATT site, this site, has grown into a compendium of brilliantly insightful articles written by an incredibly handsome man. This is a good thing. The one weakness is that, well, it’s all very large, and can tend to leave you wondering “OK, but what do I DO?”.

    The QRG series has been designed to fulfill the specific need to “get straight to the action”, without sacrificing the more universal and context-independent appeal of many of the articles you typically find here on the site.

    Some things are best read, some things are best heard, some things are best said and heard. The QRG video, in combination with the QRG ebook, covers all these bases for you. One of the coolest parts of the video, I think, is the oral walkthrough of the entire AJATT “philosophy” (AKA “mental tools”) section.

    Over and above that is the “greater than the some of its parts” effect, that inexplicable magic you get in a video that text can never quite replicate. This video is a lot like sitting with me, in my “Fortress of Solitude”, having a conversation. If that’s something you would enjoy, then I think you might enjoy this video as well.

    What’s In The Package?

    • A video file — digital download.
    • WMV format.
    • File size: Approx. 425MB
    • Running time: 81 minutes
    • All the points in the QRG are covered with sparkling wit and verve.

    For best results, I recommend you:

    • Get the QRG ebook as well, if you don’t already have it. This video is designed to be used in combination with the QRG ebook, and assumes that you already own it.
    • Be learning Japanese. This video, like the current QRG ebook, is quite specifically focussed in that direction.

    Own It Now!

    Your copy is waiting for you. But “they” may try to take it away! So panic. Buy now. Treat yourself. You deserve this. Do something for yourself for a change! Et cetera ;) .

    QRG Video StandaloneQRG Video Bundle

    No Likey? No Problem!

    As with all its predecessor products, the QRG video comes with a 100%, no-questions-asked refund guarantee. If you are in anyway unhappy with the product, just shoot me an email at qrg at ajatt dot com, and I will be happy to give you a full refund on your purchase.
    Even if I try to ask questions, you can be all “nuh-uh…no questions!”

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    Thank you to everyone who's donated to AJATT in the past. I know it wasn't easy suddenly becoming so thin and pretty. Thank you.

    Original AJATT Products

    Read on:
  • AJATT Store
  • QRG: July 31 is Still July
  • The QRG
  • QRG The Movie: Teaser Trailer
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-11-07
  • QRG: Your Suggestions Wanted! I Mean, Humbly Requested!
  • QRG Version 1.0 Is Here!
  • Books, KBL: Khatzumoto's Book List, QRG, Video
  • Table of Contents
  • Comments (19)

    Why The Way We Read Sucks and How to Fix It: Part 4 — Why SRS Personal Development Books?

    This is the fourth article in an ongoing series. To read this series from the beginning, go here.

    Now that we’ve talked about the Unified Reading Process (check out the previous article in the series) in general, let’s take a little walk down Specificity Lane. The following advice probably applies to all kinds of books, but I’ve written it from the specific perspective of personal development/business books, which account for most of my reading right now.

    Funnily enough, the methods I am going to share with you in this and future articles seem to be on their way to allowing me to read less and less of this type of book: since SRSing allows me to remember so much of what I’ve already read, there’s no need to buy any old (unoriginal, low-quality, or simply well-promoted) personal development book just for “review” or a “motivitational boost”.

    The personal development (PD) genre is as popular as it is despised…the reasons for that are interesting and warrant their own article. But for now, let’s keep to the topic at hand.

    By way of note, for the uninitiated, an SRS is a smart electronic flashcard system.

    OK, here we go!

    Anyone can read a good PD book and be at least temporarily inspired to alter her behavior…but what about 7 days, 7 weeks, 7 months and 7 years later?

    Perhaps you can’t always be surrounded by positive people, but you can at least have positive books. And that’s almost as good. The key is that contact with the information in these books be:

    • Frequent or otherwise of a nature that will change your behavior for the better.
    • But also not so frequent that you go numb to it (see: “quotes pasted on wall” for details).
    • Available to you whenever pertinent situations arise — the good ideas you come across need to be immediately available to you in a form such that action is possible. Since, fundamentally, you can only act based on the information you have in your head, these ideas, this information, effectively also needs to be in your head if it’s to be of any value. When you’re dealing with a jerk, you’re unlikely to have your trusty, well-underlined copy of How To Deal With Jerks handy — but you still need to act.

    Of course, there are some exceptions; we’re speaking very generally here.

    One is reminded of that rather sinister-sounding quote by Lenin (?apparently?):

    “A lie told often enough becomes the truth” .

    Human beings’ judgment of the correctness of many ideas appears to be determined in large part by exposure count. Expose yourself to a quote, an idea, a product enough times, and it becomes part of your reality; it becomes part of your choice-set; it becomes “true”…regardless of actual veracity or quality.

    It’s a lot like how advertising works — Coca-Cola doesn’t ceaselessly advertise that strange, corrosive beverage of theirs in order to tell you it exists — we all know it exists — they advertise it to you in order to alter your environment, your psychology, and therefore your choices. These frequent “nudges” seem to be what’s needed to push human beings over the edge.

    I mean, you didn’t think all that money was being spent on advertising with no real idea whether it worked or not, did you?*

    *I guess this did happen during the “Dot Com Boom” but…then again (at the risk of “interpreting the results to fit the theory”) while many of the Dot Coms spent a lot of $$ advertising, they didn’t continue the onslaught for years on end, plus they didn’t give their products and business models time to mature. Internet or no Internet, things like that still seem to take a few years. Not that I really know, but… :D

    A lot of the ideas we come into contact with in our daily lives are, at the very least, half-truths; they also tend to be of a negative, destructive, or otherwise unproductive nature. Turn on the news, a movie or a pop song, and you’re likely to be assaulted with a stream of incredibly repetetive, low-quality assumptions about life and human capability, wrapped in an immensely entertaining package, sort of like junk food for the mind: tastes great, widely condoned, kills, and it’s mostly high-fructose corn syrup anyway. Personal development books, at their best, are collections of better ideas, better techniques, better alternatives for working our lives. Better food for the mind. And if some people accuse you of mental orthorexia? Well, stupidity and blindly following the crowd tend to be their own “punishment” (said in menacing tone), in the long run.

    The more we can expose ourselves to these better ideas…the better. And in my brief experience on the topic, I’ve found that it’s not enough to just have vaguely remembered inklings of certain ideas — it seems like it’s important to re-view them somewhat more fully, more directly. Basically, “repetition is the mother of skill“, if you will. You can’t just have seen that Coke ad once. In fact, I read somewhere that a typical consumer needs to be exposed to an ad about 7 times before they actually make the purchase. Magic number, I know. But clearly, either way, what we’re dealing with is not an inherent property of advertising, but of the relationship between human beings, ideas and action.

    So, rather than passively receiving other people’s advertising your messages, why not “advertise” to yourself the ideas that you like and find important? That’s the basic idea. If we want to change our habitual behavior, then it comes as no surprise that we may need some level of habitual expsosure to the behavior-changing ideas.

    Another problem I found with not SRSing or otherwise broadly reviewing personal development books, was that my behavior and opinions would become completely biased in the direction of whichever author I was currently reading. Of course, there is some good in this. But the problem with being so totally saturated in one author’s world is that one inherits all her blindspots and biases as well. Much good can be gained, but much good also gets lost, ignored, or replaced by the bad-to-mediocre.

    Intellectually, we all know that no single author is going to have the fullest, best answers on every issue. But recency can blind us to this in a practical sense. SRSing information allows your techniques and philosophy to remain a unique, well-balanced amalgam of all the good stuff you’ve been exposed to: your very own syncretic approach, taking the best from wherever you find it — like a mental file that is actually appended to, not just constantly overwritten.

    But, at the end of the day, I don’t really know, it’s all really experimental :) . Maybe you can pick up on some of these ideas, and take them somewhere interesting.

    I really hope this has helped you…it may just be me going off on a personal tangent. Anyway, let me know…gently :)

    In the next article in this series, we’ll cover some practical elements of this SRSing-beyond-pure-language-learning business (including demonstrating some actual SRS cards), as well as answer some pertinent questions. If you have anything you want answered, now’s the time to put it forward. It may or may not get dealt with, but, you never know until you try, right? ;)

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    Thank you to everyone who's donated to AJATT in the past. I know it wasn't easy suddenly becoming so thin and pretty. Thank you.

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    Read on:
  • Why The Way We Read Sucks and How to Fix It: Part 3 — The Unified Reading Process
  • Chinese Project Notes 3: Environment-Building + The Laddering Method Reloaded
  • AJATT Twitter Tweets for Week Of 2009-12-12
  • KhatzuMemo Update: The Big Cellphone Fix, et al.
  • Why The Way We Read Sucks and How to Fix It: Part 2
  • Why The Way We Read Sucks, And How To Fix It: Part 1
  • Surusu Update: Rep speed up, Import items fix, Saving “Retain data”
  • Reading, SRS
  • Table of Contents
  • Comments (42)

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