POLL: Digital media v traditional media

[jeff_lindqvist]

100% digital resources at the moment. Ask me again in a couple of months and I may give a different answer.

[dicentra8]

Ended up voting on the 75% or more through digital media. At this moment maybe it would be more the "almost 100% digital media", mostly because that's how I can access to native material for my TL. But I also like to have physical textbooks, books and a dictionary (which I've used through my learning).

[aokoye]

I appreciate that mp3 sound files are “digitized” and fit Bluepaint’s definition of digital media. Nevertheless, I would be inclined to view all recorded sound files (Edison’s phonograph cylinders, 78 rpm shellac records, 33-1/3 microgroove LP vinyl records, magnetic wire, reel-to-reel magnetic tapes, audio cassettes, VHS tapes, Beta tapes, compact disks, DVDs, mp3 files, et cetera) as being on a continuum within the category of “traditional media”; that is, they are simply audio files which have been prepared for use in the oral/aural practice of learning a language. Thus, whether I digitize audio files from my collection of shellac or vinyl records, audio cassettes, reel-to-reel tapes, or CDs, or download similar files from the Yojik.eu website or elsewhere on the internet, I consider their use in mp3 format to be simply more convenient than other media. However, I do not consider playing these mp3 files on my Sony Walkman to be equivalent to using “digital media” such as the internet, cell-phone apps, YouTube, FluentU, Yabla, and the like.

I agree with all of this. It's funny because I wrote my first post while listening to a vinyl record at a coffee shop I frequently go to. I also don't really see the function (in this context) in differentiating something like a CD from an MP3, especially if you've ripped MP3s from said CD.

[Bluepaint]

I wanted a way to draw a line between tracks you listen to on a mobile or computer and those objects for which you put in a machine and press play. I know you can rip tracks from them but you had the CD and used that first. I mean you could scan books on to your computer and read them that way but I'd still consider the book as the main element and thus traditional. However, it's a fun poll and open to interpretation. No scientific results are being drawn from it

[Iversen]

Ahem ... tjah...bob bob...

It's actually slightly more complicated than just choosing a number on a scale.

I'm not sure about the overall percentage, partly because I mostly do more than one thing at any one time, but these days my computer is switched on most of the time when I'm at home. The problem is that much of the time I'm listening to my collection of classical instrumental music instead of listening to talking heads. Before I started to transfer my music collection to files around 2015 I spent much more time listening to stuff on the internet and I often watched TV with the sound switched on. These days I mostly have the sound switched off and read the subtitles instead, and I only spend an hour now and then listening to speech on the internet - mostly Youtube clips. This is of course not what the doctor prescribed, but I want my music collection to become as orderly and complete as I can make it as soon as possible (with themes pages and all that), and I can combine that endeavour with working on written sources, but not with listening to speech.

I read a lot extensively on the internet, and (just as a rough guess) maybe half of that would be in English because that's where you find most of the information about specific scientific or cultural subjects. LLORG obviously belongs into that category, except that it must count as intensive work when I write things here in my weaker languages. I do also work intensively in other ways online, but for the time being almost exclusively with written sources - like digital dictionaries and grammars. Not one second on Skype or other kinds of oral communication, but sometimes I do listen to a documentary on Youtube or some other homepage in a relevant language - but that can't amount to much. No films.

However the internet is still of paramount importance to me because that's where I get almost all my written study texts. The method is that I read a fair number of homepages extensively and find there things that seem to be suitable for intensive study, and then I make mono- or bilingual Word-files and print them out - and study the print-outs while sitting in my comfy chair, not in front of the screen. And then I guess we are in the department of traditional study materials. If you count the time I spend on intensive study of texts, making wordlists and reading grammar books etc. then I'm fairly sure that the total time expenditure passes the elusive unicorn limit of precisely 50% by a wide margin.

And one funny (or sad) fact: I rarely read Danish books these days - only when I'm at the library and have an hour or two spend. But I still get enough input in my maternal language because I read my daily newspaper (on paper), and I read a lot of subtitles in Danish (or sometimes other languages, if available), but before I restarted my language studies around 2006 I would probably average 2-3 books in a typical week. And some days I don't even say a word in Danish, let alone other languages, but I don't miss that dose of smalltalk.

[Gordafarin2]

CDs and DVDs may be physical, but they are by definition digital media

I digitise everything as much as possible. I'm too good at losing things, and have moved house too many times, to keep a large physical library. I do have some paper books on hand that I still use, and marking up a text on paper definitely has its uses. I still take handwritten notes. But 90% at least of my language resources are either stored on my computer/phone/Kindle, or accessed online.