I'd just like to say that I have launched a Chinese character challenge over at Hacking Chinese aimed towards helping people stop relying on rote learning and use mnemonics and active studying instead to deal with tricky characters.
I'm going to participate in the challenge myself and I'm going to use Skritter. People who already use Skritter should find it very easy to join the challenge. Check the article for more details, but in essence, it's about actively studying and dealing with reviews we fail, rather than just repeating them again and again until they sort of stick.
Read about the challenge: http://ow.ly/gv84H
Join the group on Skritter: http://ow.ly/gv848
新年快樂!
Best wishes,
Olle