Wow! To find out that they’re still working on it at all is exciting! I check back on EtoEto every so often. And figured I would poke my head in today. It’s all gone! Like the text is there, but the formatting and everything else is gone. That combined with the interview gives me some hope, maybe?

I totally get what you mean about “the Koichi Empire” though. When I first started learning Japanese in 2012/2013, he was such a presence. Like, not only did he create this great learning stuff, but he personally was actively involved in the communities that he created. And now it’s like we never see/hear from him. I’m glad that WaniKani is so successful (it’s like, *the* place to learn Kanji now), but I wish that the other sides of Japanese learning had been developed so thoroughly.

I actually read an article talking about what probably happened (not written by the Tofugo team). It goes something like: when TextFugu was created, it was pioneering Japanese learning online. And then WaniKani was born, which completely overhauled the way that a lot of people learn Kanji. But lots of online Japanese textbooks a la TextFugu began popping up. Which kind of took away its specialness. WaniKani stayed special because of how well it did what it does. But with competition for TextFugu, Koichi felt like he had to make the other side of things just as unique and powerful as WaniKani. But grammar can’t be done in its entirety via SRS (see bunpro – which is awesome, but absolutely requires a separate resource to really understand the material). So Koichi basically got in over his head trying to push the limits of learning. And now feels like it’s been so long, that in order to release and be successful, it has to blow everyone’s minds. But perfection is impossible. Therefore the vicious cycle emerges.

Hopefully we’ll eventually see something. And I hope that Koichi knows that EtoEto doesn’t need to be perfect. Mostly, people would just like to know if it’s even still in progress.