Learn Japanese Today

Okay, so now the we don’t have to talk about scandal anymore, lets take a good look at this paper.

Ease of Use:5

Right now, there is no English site. So you’ll have to struggle through with Rikai or some other reading tool and see how you do. Generally it’s a lot like the Yomiuri in that the articles are very readable when you can get them in the right form, but the links can cause trouble. Also, when you click on a story off the front page, it only gives you the first paragraph and you have to click 続き読む (continue reading) to get to the full article. Not a big deal, but it gets annoying.  One thing it does have going for it is the fewer categories. On the Yomiuri, there’re definitely times when a story that’s both about the environment and national news can confuse you because you won’t know what tab to click on. At Mainichi, it’s just News Center, Entertainment & Sports, and Lifestyle. It’s a lot simpler.

Authenticity: 9.5

The sense I got is that the vocabulary for the newspaper is a little lower, and they tend to use more commonplace words. They also seem to have a bit more reader friendly topics for stories, while the Yomiuri seems more targeted to bureaucrats and the highly educated. If The Daily Yomiuri is “The New York Times,” then the Mainichi Daily is the “USA Today.”

Quantity of Knowledge: 8.5

There’s a lot of stuff on here, but it’s not quite as meticulous as The Daily Yomiuri. I personally don’t think this is that important though, because if you can read everything on the site, you probably don’t need my advice anymore anyway.

Price: 10

Can’t argue with that.

Fun: 7.5

Even with the WaiWai column gone, this is still a pretty interesting paper. It is still a credible newspaper, so it can’t all be fun and games, but I think it generally has some pretty interesting stuff going on.

Overall: 7.5

I’m giving the Daily Yomiuri the nod on this one because they have an English site up, which is pretty important for checking what you’ve learned. However, as soon as Mainichi is up in English in September, I’ll do a reevaluation, which I believe will be much more favorable. It seems the content on Mainichi is much more interesting and suited for learners than Yomiuri.

Also, Happy One-Month Anniversary to Learn Japanese Today! Thanks for all the support you guys, you keep me workin’.

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