They say Korean is the most difficult language in the world next to English, and yet I've had to learn fluent, high-level Korean in a little over a year with no former background in Asian languages. Granted, I have a lot of natural language ability, but a lot of what I've learned about learning languages applies to anyone. As such, using some of the things I've learned about in the last year or so, I think it'd be more than possible for us to create our own Japanese learning program and get some volunteers on the Compendium to learn enough basic Japanese to at least establish relations with Japanese sites.
The only catch is that it'd take a consistent 20-30 minutes a day, every day, for an extended period of time (we're talking several months at least), but considering the site should be around for much longer than that, it'd be worth it. It might also require use of a printer every week or two if you can't be at a computer every day (say you go on vacation or you have lots of siblings and share a computer), or a lot of pens and notebooks at the expense of more time and careful planning.
If Zeality is interested in spotting such a program (and maybe even trying it himself), then we might be able to get something started.
