this post was submitted on 25 Jan 2026
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Something I notice is that when I see a text in a language I'm not comfortable with, I need a conscious effort to not skip it and try to translate and/or interpret. Now, wherever there is microblogging, I get the impression Japanese people just love to make small posts, and going by my subs/followed feed this past week, I noticed I was starting to slow down on the posts of the Japanese folks I follow, unconsiously trying to read what's written.
Also though technically not studying it, some Italian posts appear in my feed every now and then, and also been noticing I've been getting more and more comfortable with the language, even being able to interpret a good chunk of the texts. To a smaller extent the same happens to French.
I notice myself skipping like that all the time. I follow a few Japanese accounts, and unless I'm making an effort, I just scroll right past those posts. Glad to hear you've gotten to the point where you're more likely to read them than not!
Your brain will take whatever shortcut is easiest, and when you're learning to read, that's skipping past. Takes a lot of practice before you look at text and can't not read it.
I think a lot about my experience learning to read English (native language) as a kid. How there was that big gap of time where I could read, but it wasn't automatic. I'd play games but ignore most text. I see the same in my nieces and nephews when playing games with them. For so long, your brain decides the discomfort of reading is too much to be worth the dopamine you'll get from the message.
I also think a lot about how I've heard that those uncomfortable moments, where you constantly want to stop, are the parts where you're learning. Hope it pans out, because right now reading Japanese outside of learner content is always a struggle for me.
Something I found that would help me was a Norwegian police log/announcement feed a defunct bot here on the fediverse, and that I have since replicated it with another tool. They're short, straight to the point, and help in the field I'm the worst at, vocabulary.
And recently, while browsing the /all page from my instance, I noticed there's a bot for the Japanese branch of Yahoo News, and their titles felt like the Norwegian police log. I have no use for either, but hey, I consume news a lot already, so why not follow them? e.e
Also as you say, the brain likes shortcuts, so since news follow a similar structure pattern despite the language, it ends up being a comparison shortcut.
Also in case you'd be interested, the bots, both for microblogging platforms or adjacent ones:
@api.politiet.no.politiloggen.v1.rss@rss-parrot.net
@yahoo_news@misskey.io