The Off Topic Topic

[The Brain]

With modern printed Japanese it at least provides the basic meaning. My Edo period woodcut pamphlet is still beyond the app, I only get a few cryptic glimpses of words.

[HVC]

I genuinely think the Google translate stuff is the biggest "we live in sci-fi now" change in the last few years.

I know there are issues and I wouldn't use it for a professional context etc but it's incredible. Especially if you get the Google Translate app on your phone because you can hold the camera over text in, say, Greek or Cyrillic and it will translate it on your screen into English.

It's amazing.

When I was in Vietnam I used it to translate a Japanese AC remote in real time on my phones screen. We're truly living in a magical time

[Tonitrus]

Surprised Hungarian is doing well now.
...Swedish to engksih  translations were perfect...

Maybe not as perfect as you think.

As long as it can spit out "Bork bork bork", the Swedish is fine.

[Josquius]

The kanji of the year has been announced: War.

https://newsdig.tbs.co.jp/articles/-/227447?display=1

[The Larch]

Just read an article on the decline of printed newspapers in Spain. Apparently according to data from september there's not a single newspaper nowadays in Spain that sells more than 60k copies per day anymore. El País, the country's top generalist newspaper, is at 59.147 copies per day, and Marca, the top sports newspaper, is at 51.189 copies. Surprisingly, regional newspapers are doing relatively well compared to national level ones. La Voz de Galicia, my region's top newspaper, is at 44.340 copies per day, for instance.

I have the feeling that the final death of printed newspapers might take place during our lifetimes.

[celedhring]

I haven't read a print newspaper in years, tbf. And I used to get it nearly every day.

[The Larch]

I haven't read a print newspaper in years, tbf. And I used to get it nearly every day.

My father used to buy it every single day, nowadays he only buys it on the weekends. Even he, one of the least technologically competent people you'll ever find, has turned to the digital version.

[Sheilbh]

Just read an article on the decline of printed newspapers in Spain. Apparently according to data from september there's not a single newspaper nowadays in Spain that sells more than 60k copies per day anymore. El País, the country's top generalist newspaper, is at 59.147 copies per day, and Marca, the top sports newspaper, is at 51.189 copies. Surprisingly, regional newspapers are doing relatively well compared to national level ones. La Voz de Galicia, my region's top newspaper, is at 44.340 copies per day, for instance.

I have the feeling that the final death of printed newspapers might take place during our lifetimes.

Interesting - that is so low in comparison with the UK. The Daily Record which is the Scottish sister paper of the Daily Mirror has circulation of over 60k. Regional papers are in a far worse position though - the Press and Journal (basically the North of Scotland) has circulation of around 30k.

But it's a really striking divide in Europe - proportionally, with the exception of Japan, the countries with the highest newspaper readership in the world are all in North-West Europe: the Nordics, UK, Netherlands, Germany. I think all of those countries have readership figures of about three times or more higher than Spain. It's one of the few things where I wonder if the explanation might actually be something to do with Protestant print culture/relatively early print capitalism?

[HVC]

I imagine it's hard to tie that to the early printing press lol. What's the percentage of old people in more print heavy countries?

*edit* Or even fake circulation, print to dump?

[Grey Fox]

Interesting you guys still have numbers to talk about.

The last circulation numbers I can find for Quebec papers is 2015. Around 250k per paper.

This Sunday, the 18th, is the last Sunday with any printed newspaper being distributed. The last one, Journal de Montreal/Quebec is finally giving up.

[Josquius]

I'd more just blame the weather and lack of other things to do.

[Threviel]

Electricity is insanely expensive right now in Sweden (and in the resto of Europe I believe) due to a lot of shit going wrong and it's unusually cold.

We are not used to expensive electricity and there are a lot of tips going on about how to use less. The municipal water works in Gothenburg says that we can't go around showering like we do, we should shower like the Danes. Apparently Gothenburgers use 40% more water than Copenhageners.

So a tip for tourists in Denmark, be polite about the smell.

[Grey Fox]

How expensive?

[Sheilbh]

I imagine it's hard to tie that to the early printing press lol. What's the percentage of old people in more print heavy countries?

I agree - I almost never think it's "culture" but it seems interesting that the countries that most got into the reformation and the role print culture played in that now have the highest readership of newspapers. For example the difference between Belgium (150 per 1,000) and the Netherlands (300 per 1,000).

In terms of age it's a bit mixed. In very broad terms though in general Southern Europe is older than Northern Europe.

*edit* Or even fake circulation, print to dump?

Yeah the readership figures are sightly different they're about respondents who consume printed press on a daily basis. So they shouldn't include any dumps - but might include people who read the paper in their office or at the library etc.

[Sheilbh]

Interesting you guys still have numbers to talk about.

The last circulation numbers I can find for Quebec papers is 2015. Around 250k per paper.

This Sunday, the 18th, is the last Sunday with any printed newspaper being distributed. The last one, Journal de Montreal/Quebec is finally giving up.

On circulation it's really questionable in the UK - and same about reach. All of the Murdoch paper's pulled out of the industry circulation figures once it became clear the Sun was about to lose its top spot

But also there is the question of digital - which present an entirely different picture than print circulation. In the UK, the Guardian and the FT become far bigger, more widely read papers if you consider digital because there's no paywall for the Guardian and there's quite a lot of corporate digital subscriptions in the FT.

In a way I think our image of which papers are dominant is still very shaped by print culture and the impact that has on TV/broadcast journalism (going through tomorrow's front pages etc) which doesn't reflect their impact because there are far more readers on digital. I think in the UK if you look at actual or estimated circulation figures then the dominant papers are the Mail, Sun and Mirror - if you include online then the Guardian's a top three publisher even though it sells as little as 10% of those big print titles.