Cellphone cameras and digital-video devices have turned college students into campus watchdogs and have made YouTube a household name. In doing so, the tools have generated an amazing amount of digital content.
It would take 161 billion gigabytes of storage space (or, for those who like their standards of measurement more tangible, an equal number of iPod Shuffles) to hold all the digital material created in the last year, according to a new study. The study, conducted by IDC, a firm specializing in tech-related market research, argues that digital information is growing ever more democratic. By 2010, the company says, more than 70 percent of existing digital content will have been created by consumers. –Brock Read
12 Responses to A Deluge of Digital Content
dank48 - March 16, 2012 at 8:35 am
This is what happens when the gummint legislates language, says another old coot. Btw, contra the trend of the past fifty years, coot, despite the dictionary’s “a harmless, simple person; broadly ‘fellow’ 4c (man, boy [of the lower classes]),” just doesn’t seem quite the mot juste. Probably sexism on my part.
When teaching ESL in the seventies, I found it confused students to learn that English had gender-specific terms but that in some but not all cases these could be offensive. It’s interesting that, while we may be enthusiastic about eliminating such terms in English, we tend to accept them without quibble in other languages.
Ambrose Bierce noted the same vacancy, in English, although Ms. hadn’t come along back then: there were Mr., Mrs., and Miss, but nothing to denote an unmarried man. He proposed Mh., to be pronounced “Mush.”
jffoster - March 16, 2012 at 8:50 am
Dont worry, Louisiana francophones will continue to use Mademoiselle. I suspect Quebec, New Brunswick, and Maine francophones will also.
BTW, in parts of Mexico in the 1950s, it was customary to address teen males as Joven ‘Youth’. Whether this still be common practice, I don’t know. Teen females were of course senhorita. (And I am aware -nh- is a Portuguese spelling but I don’t have time to do the engineering it would take to get a tilde into this Discus program.)
also BTW — no real people I know actually say “mail carrier”. It’s postman . Nor is there any such rank / term as *midshipwoman or *midshipperson in the U S Navy. They are all midshipmen , irrespective of sex.
Dr_Decay - March 16, 2012 at 9:23 am
Ne vous inquiètez pas Mme. Ferris. As long as the customers are flattered, the boulangers and boulangères will continue to mademoiselle you when the situation seems to call for it – especially if you smile afterwards. Neither the Académie nor the government will be able to stop them.
11182967 - March 16, 2012 at 10:18 am
When we moved to Mississippi from The North in 1973 we were repelled by the ubiquitous and, to yankee ears, obsequious “ma’am” and “sir.” We instructed our second grade son to address his teacher politely by saying, “Yes, Mrs. Johnson” and to skip the ”ma’am.” Within a few weeks I heard myself “ma’am-ing’ and “sir-ing” all over the place, and twenty years since I left the South I still hear myself using, especially, the “ma’am” part of that pair. In fifteen years in Mississippi I learned that “ma’am” can be tonally varied to convey a wide range of attitudes. I also learned that “miz” is the vocal representation of both Mrs. and Ms., which is really awfully convenient. I suspect that the French will also find ways to perpetuate distinctions they believe to be important and to obscure those which are not, and that, as is usually the case, even among the linguistically officious French spoken language will trump the rules of written French.
(I also had a colleague in Mississippi–a Cal Berkeley/Harvard chemist–who created a non-profit organization to promote his love for Medieval and Renaissance music. He called it the Mississippi Academy of Ancient Music, or MAAM, and solicited support by asking potential donors to be willing to say “Yes, MAAM.” You can see his house–the actual MAAM–to the right of the bridge over the railroad tracks in the final scene of “Brother, Where Art Thou.”) There’s your trivia for a Friday.
carolsaller - March 16, 2012 at 11:00 am
Am I the only woman of un certain âge who feels patronized by a greeting of “Miss”—or even
worse, “Young lady”? Men who say this insist they’re being gallant, but to me, it’s no different from greeting a small man with “Big fellah” or a large man with “Slim.”
sisgett - March 16, 2012 at 11:05 am
If you’ve ever lived on a rural mail route (RFD), you have always referred to your “mail carrier”, a shortened version of “rural mail carrier”.
jffoster - March 16, 2012 at 11:36 am
To your if-clause, yes I have. And to your second, “then clause” , no I haven’t. We referred to the RFD man as the (rural) route man, where ( ) item is optional. Or sometimes the postman.
wilkenslibrary - March 16, 2012 at 3:26 pm
Reading this made me nostalgic for the summer job I had in a bookstore in Avignon back in the ’60s. The owners, a brother and sister, were Monsieur and Mademoiselle. When m/f couples came in, it was “Bonjour, M’sieuDame,” and the same when they left. We used “Mlle” mostly for girls and “Mme” for anyone over a certain age, but I don’t think that there were rules about age limits. I don’t want to sigh for the good old days, but…
Betsy Smith/Adjunct Professor of ESL/Cape Cod Community College
willismg - March 16, 2012 at 5:23 pm
When I was young, my grandparents sent everything to me as “Master Michael Willis”. This would have been the English male equivalent of the French Mademoiselle, or English Miss, wouldn’t it?
jffoster - March 16, 2012 at 5:51 pm
Depends on the region and custom. In our area, ‘Master” was used for young pre-teen boys, but no title at all for teen boys. So it wasn’t the –valent of Mlle. or Miss.
Erin Brenner - March 17, 2012 at 1:48 pm
You’re not the only one, Carol. I had the same thought as I read: I’m no longer young enough to be called “Miss” or Mademoiselle,” and I find being called so to be a bit patronizing. “Ma’am” and “Madam” are just fine with me.
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