I would like the read aloud feature to have more user control. At Present I can only start/stop, I can’t go back one word or sentence with a hotkey, I can’t click on the sentence/word I want to start reading from. The usability of this feature leaves a lot to be desired.
However, I do have a suggestion. You should add a way to switch between translation mode and read-aloud mode, so that in read-aloud mode each click on a word is considered a “start reading from here” command. Also, if you add hotkeys like arrows, for example: left-right to move word previous-next word, and up-down to move to next-previous sentence. That should be a big improvement.
A bit about the backgrounds. Why is it so important to listen to the text and repeat after the voiceover? One of the references is the method used by Luca Lampariello https://www.lucalampariello.com/blog/, who learns by listening and repeating after the voice-over 20 times (and sometimes up to 70 times!!!) before moving on to the next step of understanding/translating/exercising. But I am not voting for or against this method, I just find it interesting and having more granular read-aloud controls is a step forward.
Right now I’m using this service (it is not ideal, but it allows you to use hotkeys to switch between sentences) to practise, and the only reason I don’t want to do it in Readlang is because I have almost no control over it.
The lucalampariello reference is appreciated. The tug of war between learning by reading and learning by listening has been substantially closed by readlang in the past year. Yeah!
For myself, being able to converse – and, right now, being able to hear clearly – is the only thing I really care about anymore. I figure my reading vocabulary is probably well over 50k words Spanish, but it still isn’t sufficient for listening to a native podcast, nor a basic conversation among friends, where I don’t have a transcript.
You: “Why is it so important to LISTEN to the text and repeat after the voiceover?”
I couldn’t agree more around this point, although I think (at least for me) the hearing practice is more important. If I know a native speaker doesn’t understand me, whether my diction is bad or I lack vocabulary, I can fix that – even with a very limited speaking vocabulary – provided I can comprehend the native speakers feedback. And the native speaker is far more likely to stay engaged with me, for an extended period of time, if they don’t need to baby-talk to me.
Reading is mostly just the glue to tie the skills together, but it is a very useful glue!
I am of mixed feelings about your request for far more navigation control while reading. I am concerned about the opportunity cost.
It seems to me that a single key loop back to the last word, although I would suggest the last sentence, would be very useful and might not have too high a coding cost. I’m not sure about the cost/benefit of all the other navigation. Steve?
So, this is an example of the stuff I have been playing with and a pretty good example of why I am a big advocate of the “readaloud improvement” suggestion, in general, which dovetails pretty well with what I have been hoping to shape Blitz mode toward. In Spanish, I just cobbled together this ditty:
Trataba a traba pero esta trabado. Traedor, trae el tratado.
Try saying that 10 times, really fast. And remember to roll the “Rs” properly! And can you even hear it?
Oh, holy grail, I didn’t want to reopen the discussion, I wasn’t aware that it had already happened and a consensus had been reached 
And I just want to give feedback without thinking about the cost of implementation. Steve must have data on how popular the read-aloud feature is, and prioritise its improvement based on some data. My feedback is the voice of the customer, not a data-driven approach.
And yes, I am impressed that you have 50 words in your vocabulary… It must be C2/CEFR level in reading and I can hardly imagine how much time it took to get to that level. And listening… Ok, that’s something else. I consider it the most important skill, much more important than speaking. But again, I don’t want to justify anything.
I’ve just added a couple of new keyboard shortcuts that you might like! They were inspired by YouTube which has the same ones:
j: skip back 10s (mp3) or 8 words (TTS)l: skip forwards 10s (mp3) or 8 words (TTS)
These were added along with an experimental new mp3 upload feature which you might also be interested in: NEW mp3 audio upload with auto-transcription!
That’s great! I’m looking forward to trying it out!