Invitation

[Lucien Bos]

Hi Evita!

First, I want to let you know that your decks are an amazing resource. I can appreciate the amount of work it must have taken to curate. My bucket list includes learning Korean and I look forward to using the content you provided.

Secondly, I am currently developing a completely online (and user-friendly) alternative to Anki (with the same features as Anki and more) called Kitsun. The platform just went into open beta after having a successful closed beta with users from the WaniKani website (A very popular SRS app for learning Japanese Kanji).

I would love to expand into other languages and invite creators (including you) to check out the platform and see what they would like to see changed or added. As a user you are be able to import or create a deck and share it with others with the click of a button. Of course, when you want to update the deck, you can do so instantly for all current users.

My main goal with this platform is to bring both creators and users closer to one another. I want to build a website with the tools needed for creators to express their creativity while making sure that the platform is user-friendly for the average user.

I believe that if given the right tools, creators will be able to build better decks for everyone willing to learn. On the other hand, I recognize that due to a less attractive interface and complicated setup, the average user can be a little declined to use platforms such as Anki, making decks such as yours harder to access and use.

This is why I'd love to hear your perspective as a creator, as I am aware of your talent as one. I want to create a product that is appreciated by the average user but also has the depth of Anki when needed.

As a full disclaimer, since hosting the website, database and development is not cheap, this will become a paid service upon launch. However, I do wish that content creators are able to receive compensation for their decks (only if they want it) by offering 'paid decks' in the future.

Please take a look at https://kitsun.io or contact me at in...@kitsun.io in case you are interested!

I look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards,
Lucien from Kitsun.io

[Evita]

If you haven't used my decks yet, how do you know they are amazing? Your compliments sound insincere.

I tried to take a look at your website, but it asked me to sign up. Sorry, I'm not doing that. I wish you luck with your project but I don't believe it will succeed. People will simply not sign up for paid content when so much free content (including Anki, Memrise, and Quizlet) is available.

I'm going to tell you the same thing I told someone else who asked about using my decks on their site:

You may use my decks freely only for personal studying purposes.

You may not use my decks for any commercial purpose.

You may include a 100 cards for demonstration purposes in a free project like something on github.

[Lucien Bos]

Hi!

I don't believe my comments are insincere as I personally know how much time and effort curating large decks such as yours can take. Next to that I have friends studying Korean who do use your decks and they are some of the most popular decks for Korean in general. I'm sorry if it came off wrongly.

As for signing up, yes it is an account based website as it has to save your own personal decks / progress and so on. It takes about 10 seconds as all it requires is a username, password and email.

In any case, I respect your decision and I am not going to argue about whether paid programmes can succeed or not.

Thanks for taking the time to reply!

Kind regards,
Lucien

[jamesm...@gmail.com]

Lucien, am I right thinking that your project is to make a paid version of anki which is more user friendly and has a greater emphasis on community? Is this a non-profit project where fees will only cover costs or a commercial enterprise? What innovations make Kitsun better than Anki?

[Lucien Bos]

Hi,

Thanks for your questions! That is correct, it is a commercial project. My personal goal is to make this my day job and assemble a team to help me with development and (long term goal) perhaps content creation.

The main goals and features of Kitsun are:

Modern interface
One of the most common complaints with Anki is that it looks outdated and feels un-intuitive to the average user. Kitsun is web-based and has a modern UI/UX. This also means that your cards can make use of HTML5 and CSS3 features.

Ease of starting
Anki is relatively difficult for users to get used to and it takes quite some effort to start creating cards that have the visual flair that we nowadays expect. In Kitsun there are default templates and layouts which allow the user to instantly start creating their flashcards.

Any deck created also has default settings which make sense (based on WaniKani's system).

Community Centre
Next to this, the user can just go to the Community Centre page and instantly grab the shared decks that they want, without having to download, import or tweak anything. Start learning right away.

Instant updates
Another benefit from this is that whenever the creator wants to update their shared decks, they can just do so by clicking the update button. This action will instantly update the deck for all current and future users with the changes that the creator made in the original deck which was used for publishing. No need to re-download anything.

Cloud Storage
Everything is stored in online databases and servers right under your own account. Meaning you won't need to sync or download anything.

Same Experience Everywhere
Kitsun is a progressive web app, meaning that it should provide the same experience on every type of device that supports websites (excluding some small browser limitations).

Gamification
Gamification definitely helps users with studying if done right. It boosts their studying behavior and helps build a habit. Taking a note from Wanikani, Kitsun incorporates a similar system.

Community Forums
To help build a community, Kitsun also has forums available. We have threads for every Community Deck so that users can discuss the deck or provide feedback to the creators. Once again taking notes from Wanikani on how to succesfully cultivate a beneficial learning environment for our users.

Another use for the forums is voting on new features and requesting features.

Collaboration (coming soon)
Ever wanted to create a deck with multiple people (e.g. a layout designer, a content creator, a quality checker etc)? This will soon be possible on Kitsun.

Example use-case:
On the WaniKani forums users often form bookclubs. The users can make a shared deck on which they can all collaborate to insert unknown vocab. That way other bookclub members can use the deck to pre-learn or retain the vocab they encounter while reading a certain book.

--------------------------------------------

Of course, Kitsun is still a very young project, but development is proceeding swiftly and there are a lot more features planned for the future. Most of Anki's features are already implemented while keeping it relatively easy for new users to begin by providing good default settings.


As Evita has stated that they are not interested, I will refrain from further posting here unless they give me the okay to do so.

If you would like to know more you can always contact me at in...@kitsun.io or just check out the current state of the project by going to https://kitsun.io

[jamesm...@gmail.com]

Looks interesting, good luck