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Hollywoodaction
Joined: 02 Jul 2004
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 Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 7:12 pm Post subject: |
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| Well, the US is supposedly the most technologically advanced nation, but the internet hasn't penetrated the culture as much as it has in other countries. Just look at asian countries like South Korea and Taiwan, where English is not the prominent language of the internet there. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 7:44 pm Post subject: |
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| Ah. |
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Deconstructor
Joined: 30 Dec 2003
Location: Canada
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| Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2005 3:35 am Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
The international language tends to follow the cultural, economic and military leader. French remained the international language for a century after England was indisputably the economic and military leader. France held on to the culture leadership until about WWII, but by then English had become the international language.
Another advantage English has is that all science journals of importance are written in English. Even French scientists publish in English. (!) On top of that, India uses English as a second language. As India develops (almost as fast as China), English will be strengthened. Has anyone noticed how many truly gifted Indian writers are writing in English? It seems to me that there are more good Indian writers than American, much less British or the rest. And don't forget Bollywood. India may save our jobs!! |
As you said yourself, the international language tends to follow the cultural, economic and military leader; and if China becomes all this, it is not realistic to believe that all science journals will continue to be written in English. The same applies to India: As the world focuses on them, they will focus on themselves as well, seeing their culture and language as dominant.
The good thing about all this: By the time it happens we'll all be dead!  |
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rapier
Joined: 16 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2005 5:50 am Post subject: |
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[quote="Deconstructor"]Whether we like it or not, China is going to overtake the US economy by 2040. quote]
I'm not so sure. They are experiencing severe difficulties with a lack of resources. Water- to name one. I don't think there are even enough resources left on earth to support full Chinese growth. |
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Deconstructor
Joined: 30 Dec 2003
Location: Canada
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| Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2005 8:15 am Post subject: |
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| rapier wrote: |
(Deconstructor wrote: Whether we like it or not, China is going to overtake the US economy by 2040.)
I'm not so sure. They are experiencing severe difficulties with a lack of resources. Water- to name one. I don't think there are even enough resources left on earth to support full Chinese growth. |
Yes, that's a good point. We already see what's happening with gas prices, which is due to extreme Chinese demand. If the Chinese drive at the level of the West, we may never see the sun again.
The good thing about all this is that it may make us think harder about alternative energy sources. |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2005 8:22 am Post subject: |
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| So how many years are we thinking before English becomes #2? My guess is five years. Anybody else? |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2005 8:26 am Post subject: |
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Here are some more stats to help people predict:
Growth from 2000-2005
Africa 198.3 %
Asia 164.4 %
Europe 151.9 %
Middle East 266.5 %
North America 104.9 %
Latin America / Caribbean 211.2 %
Oceania / Australia 113.5 % |
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gmat
Joined: 29 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2005 8:58 am Post subject: |
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An economy based upon cheap labor does not a Superpower make. China has a long road ahead before it becomes the dominant power (if ever).
Today, most developing countries are growing old before they get rich. China's low fertility means that its labor force will start shrinking by 2020, and 30 percent of China's population could be over 60 by mid-century. More worrisome, China's social security system, which covers only a fraction of the population, already has debts exceeding 145 percent of its GDP. Making demographics there even worse, the spreading use of ultrasound and other techniques for determining the sex of fetuses is, as in India and many other parts of the world, leading to much higher abortion rates for females than for males. In China, the ratio of male to female births is now 117 to 100 -- which implies that roughly one out of six males in today's new generation will not succeed in reproducing.
http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20040501faessay83307-p10/phillip-longman/the-global-baby-bust.html
Mith: re. the OP. Who cares? People want to use their first language to surf the net, duh! |
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Tiger Beer
Joined: 07 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2005 9:04 am Post subject: Re: English losing its prominence on the internet |
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| mithridates wrote: |
I know I put up a post on this before but it's nowhere to be found.  That's okay, this time I have a shocking title.
This is from November 2004:
If you go to internetwordstats.com right now you'll see that English has dropped down to 32.8%. |
I still find that really high.
Every major American Internet website has scrambled like crazy to get into as many foreign language markets it possibly can. Just look at YAHOO for example. Its extremely profitable to get into as many possible foreign-language markets as possible to gain the market share while you can. |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Tue Aug 09, 2005 10:02 am Post subject: |
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I see the new stats have come out. English has fallen to 31.6% (1.2% drop over 4 months), but what is more interesting is that the only language to really gain ground is...other.
http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats7.htm |
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rapier
Joined: 16 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Tue Aug 09, 2005 8:11 pm Post subject: |
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| mithridates wrote: |
I see the new stats have come out. English has fallen to 31.6% (1.2% drop over 4 months), but what is more interesting is that the only language to really gain ground is...other.
http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats7.htm |
Chinese has little international appeal: it is limited. It does not relate to a lot of other languages like English does- English draws on almost every other language in the world for its sources....how many countries have English as a first or second language- through colonisation and so on? Many, many.
If you have a group of 20 different nationalities in a room, about 17/18 of them will be able to/have to converse in English. Only 2 people will be speaking chinese- and they'll be from China and singapore.
centuries of conquest and the implanting of English across the globe cannot be effectively wiped out in a decade! If China is to gradually take over as a world language they will have to
1)become the worlds economic powerhouse (dependent on them being able to get cheap resources from Africa and S.America- which is unlikely as these markets are already taken and face exhaustion through over-exploitation).
2) Solve their own severe and worsening environmental problems.
3) Colonise economically or otherwise) many other parts of the world.
if it happens, it'll be long after we're gone. |
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Thunndarr
Joined: 30 Sep 2003
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| Posted: Tue Aug 09, 2005 9:01 pm Post subject: |
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| That table's a bit misleading. It doesn't actually measure what percentage of web pages are English, which I would guess is a lot higher than the percentage of English users. |
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Freezer Burn
Joined: 11 Apr 2005
Location: Busan
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| Posted: Tue Aug 09, 2005 9:16 pm Post subject: Re: English losing its prominence on the internet |
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| Gord wrote: |
| mithridates wrote: |
| So how long until we are second or third on the list? I'm thinking by the time the Olympics in Beijing come around that Chinese will be in #1 place. All they need is to get one on three people using the internet and they're there. |
80% of the citizens in China live in absolute poverty where running water, household phones, and electricity are either unreliable at best or absent entirely.
This is also the first year in 25 years that China will not require outside food aid to support it's population. While the east coast is somwhat developed, most of the country is nearly a century behind.
Many olympics will have passed before China has 1 in three of it's people online. |
It will take a long time for China's ground front population can have the same economic freedom as the rest of us have, it is still a very poor country from the ground up.
Why would a language that is spoken in one part of the world overtake a language that has spread all over the world, China has always been a powerhouse in regards to population, so naturally statistics are going to show in their favour because of the sheer numbers they have.
It doesn't mean that the axis is going to change, it will just mean there is a vested interest in learning the language for economic or political purpose's much like Japanese.
As another poster said, you would have to colonise the world and plant the language before it grows into a necessary form of communication. |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Tue Aug 09, 2005 10:00 pm Post subject: |
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| China blah blah blah, that's not the interesting part this time. Chinese has only gone up a few tenths. All the languages in the top ten have fallen and the only ones to gain have been Portugeuse and other. What's other? Those went from 13 to almost 20%. |
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Grotto
Joined: 21 Mar 2004
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| Posted: Tue Aug 09, 2005 10:10 pm Post subject: |
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I dont think English is losing its prominence as per say.
What is happening is that more computers are finding their way into more homes in mono-ethnic societies. China and Brazil for example their governments have made efforts to increase the number of computers in homes. |
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