E-books are now being given background noises and music in the hope to spark young people's interest in literature.
The concept is already in use in the US, where the classics of Charlotte Bronte, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and William Shakesphere come with added sound effects.
In one example, a description of rain lashing against a window in a Sherlock Holmes story will be 'enhanced' with matching noises.
The Booktrack releases are available to iPad users, with other tablet computer versions to follow.
A story by Booker Prize winner Salman Rushdie will be released later in the year with a specially crafted orchestral score.
The concept has been developed by Booktrack which synchronises music to each novel. It is funded by Peter Thiel, a co-founder of PayPal.
It works by timing the speed of each reader and the software measures the 'turning' of a page and moves the music or sounds along accordingly.
"It's always exciting to witness the creation of a new form of media. The technology promises to captivate readers in a way that will seem intuitive in hindsight," the Daily Mail quoted Thiel as saying.
However they have been greeted with horror by traditionalists, who say that the technology takes away the pleasure of having one's imagination stimulated by a story.
They also raise the prospect of having to ask an overly eager reader to turn their book down.
David Nicholls, whose bestseller One Day was recently turned into a film starring Anne Hathaway, said: "This sounds like the opposite of reading. It would be a distraction."
On this video, Amber Lee Ettinger, also known as Obama Girl, urges the Americans to save energy. It's a catchy, funny mix of pop and rap music.
LYRICS:
I need you to recycle
If you want the keys to my heart
Do you really want to get with me
You gotta know how to live smart
My love is sustainable, not just biodegradable
I wanna ride your bicycle Reduce, re-use and recycle
Youre being romantic with me
Guess what’s too gigantic for me?
Its your carbon footprint boy
(CHORUS)
And if you wanna be with me
Save your energy, Save your energy
You’re looking good but you drive an H3.
Save your energy (2x)
You’re using plastic for your groceries
Save your energy (2x)
You should act like Ed Begley
Save your energy Save it all for me
(RAP)
Hey Girl what’s these signs that you sending me
I’ve been trying to save the world conserving all my energy
We could ride in my hybrid fuel efficiency
Solo-powered sunroof’ blowin in the windy breeze
Baby I re-use, I recycle
Low flow shower heads too if you like, boo
Anything I use is biodegradable
Why you still saving all your love, what you waiting for?
(CHORUS)
And if you wanna be with me
Save your energy, Save your energy
Walking to work is so d*mn sexy
Save your energy Save your energy
Obama can be proud of you and me
Save your energy Save your energy
I’m turned on by stuff unplugged for me
Save your energy Save your energy …
Amber Lee Ettinger (born October 2, 1982) is an American actress, internet celebrity, and model. She first rose to fame as Obama Girl in her Internet video "I Got a Crush... on Obama", in which she expressed her admiration of then U.S. Senator (now President) Barack Obama. The video led to numerous sketch comedy appearances and interviews on Saturday Night Live, Geraldo at Large, The O'Reilly Factor, and Hannity.
Note: all the yellow wrods are links. You can get more information clicking on them.
The video has being promoted byAmerica's Greenest Campus, a project of Climate Culture,SmartPowerand the U.S. Department of Energy. What's that? America's Greenest
Campus is billed as "the first nationwide contest among colleges to reduce the carbon footprints of their students, faculty, alumni and staff."
Vocabulary:
To bill: to advertise something with a particular description, e.g.: The film was billed as a romantic comedy.
carbon footprint: someone's carbon footprint is a measurement of the amount of carbon dioxide that their activities produce.
You can calculate the measurement of your carbon footprint on the website below:
faculty:1. all the teachers in a university, college, or school, e.g.: a meeting for students, faculty, and administrators
2. a department or group of departments in a university, e.g.: the Faculty of Medicine; the Law Faculty
alumni:/əˈlʌm˛nai/(plural form of alumnus/əˈlʌmnəs/)
alumnus: someone who has left a school, college or university after finishing their studies there, e.g.: the alumni of UFScar.
Several famous alumni have agreed to help raise money for the school's restoration fund.
staff: the group of people who work for an organization, e.g.:
There is a good relationship between staff and pupils at the school.
The staff are not very happy about the latest pay increase.
There are just two winners on the contest: the school with the most participants and the school with the most carbon reductions per participant (winning $5,000 each).
Although all that initiative is praiseworthy, the USA reality is very different. The problem is much more complex than just saving and recycling. All the business and industrial system is corrupted. The next video is an educative documentary that makes us aware of it in a very simple and attractive way. It’s worth seeing it.
If you want to express your opinion about it, please, be comfortable to share it with us. Post a comment. Don’t worry about your English. This is a community of English learners. The practice leads to fluency.
Or if you already speak a nice English have you ever felt like inspector Clouseau on the scene above?
Yeah, sometimes learning English is not an easy task. Everybody has a moment that the tongue doesn’t obey, either the tongue simply refuses to stay between the teeth or you stress on the wrong vowel like the infamous “develÓp” hehehehe... And to make things worse, the teacher starts saying “put your hand palm on your throat”, “feel your tongue”, “be careful! you can’t open your mouth as you open on /T/ just stay with your mouth closed and blow”. What??? You must think “she’s crazy”, I would say “maybe”. But one thing is sure “I don’t give up like inspector Clouseau’s teacher gave up”. I love what I do! More than that, it’s an enormous joy when I see a person who had difficulty speaking English speak fluently. And I’ve seen many of you doing it!
Now, let’s understand the scene context . It’s not the case that inspector Clouseau can’t speak English. He already speaks it. At the beginning of the scene he’s speaking English and he also speaks in English with the teacher. He just wants “to speak a flawless accent... so as not to arouse suspicion” as himself said on the scene. That’s why he asks for “an accent coach”.
Imagine that a so discreet French accent would arouse some suspicion!!! You must watch the film to see if he can change his accent. The film in English of course, after all you observing the accent!
flaw (noun) /flɔː/a mistake or fault in something that makes it useless or lesseffective
flawless /ˈflɔləs/(adj) without any mistakes, marks, or bad features
accent coach: it is a professional who helps to reduce accent. On the scene the accent coach is trying to reduce inspector Clouseau’s French accent.
Although sometimes the learning process can be a little difficult we can make it fun and pleasant. Did you like the song at the scene end ? Why don’t you learn to sing it?
Here we go.
GOT TO BE REAL Performed By Cheryl Lynn – 1978
"Got to Be Real" is a song by Cheryl Lynn released in 1978 and still makes success. The song is currently being used for the UK TV Advertising Campaign for 'Marks & Spencer'.
Post a comment about what you think difficult on learning English or a funny experience you’ve had. Anything you want. Remember this space is for us to change ideas and experiences.
Simon Cowell, one of the judges of the American TV program ‘American Idol’, called the song “Friday” by Rebecca Black a 'hair-dryer' song.
Hair-dryer song?
Simon Cowell explains what is a 'hair-dryer' song. He says that a 'hair-dryer' song is “a song girls sing into their hair dryers as they’re getting ready to go out”. Based on his definition the hair-dryer would be the microphone.
He also said the song “Friday” reminds another 'hair-dryer' song “Saturday Night” song by Whigfield (1994). Do you remember it? It follows below.
Something I thought funny is that both songs are titled by a day of the week: "Friday" and "Saturday night". And actually, these are the days girls most use their hair-dryers!!
Talking about hair-dryer I couldn’t help myself posting some hair-dryer cartoons:
by Vivian Barone
Glossary:
I couldn’t help myself: I couldn’t stop myself, I couldn’t avoid.
Rebecca Black –INTERNET has made her famous
Rebecca’s YouTube video for her song “Friday” went viral. Rebecca Black is considered an internet meme, she has had 18 million views on Youtube in few days. Yes folks, over 18 million people have seen this video.
Even Rebecca was surprised by the instantaneous repercussion. She said: “After seeing it go from 4,000 views to 70,000 views in one night and then waking up to see it was at 200,000 views, that’s when I knew it was going to be big.” … “I have been so mind-blown with the whole thing,” she says. “I didn’t really expect much to come out of it. Just maybe some friends and some family would see it.”
Even Wikipedia has a topic about her!
That shows the power of social midia – specifically Twitter and Facebook in the ability to create "overnight sensations”.
Although most people on the internet has voted her to be the worst song, she does have a few people, who like her song.
See what people have been saying about her song:
“Love it!I’ve never seen anything cause so much controversy. I think it’s genius. the fact that everyone’s getting upset about it is hysterical. any song to do with the weekend annoys you. It reminds me of ‘Saturday Night;’ do you remember that [1994] song by Whigfield? It’s what we call a ‘hair-dryer song,’ a song girls sing into their hair dryers as they’re getting ready to go out. But the fact that it’s making people so angry is brilliant.”
“Why are people so cruel, can’t a girl make a song about a day and call out other days and have a creepy black guy in the video chasing school buses? This is how the internet works. They take the dumbest thing alive and make it popular… they helped her career criticizing her they made her more marketable.”
“ The poor girl is only 13 – of course she’s going to sing about boys and fun. That’s all she knows.”
“ok...... really people ... i mean i love to sing ... but she ruined it for me .. just shut up really take singing lessons it has been stuck in my head for 1 million freaking years!!! and the lyrics is like someone is talking... i mean who writes " yesterday was thursday , now today is Friday!"
"Why is a 13-year-old driving that car? Why aren't they wearing seatbelts? And why is an adult rapper following them? "
"I hope you cut yourself and I hope you get an eating disorder so you'll look pretty. I hope you cut and die."
Charlie Sheen said on his twitter: “Rebecca Black, we don't hate you because you're famous. You're famous because we hate you”.
Rebecca explained why she recorded the song Firday: She said the producers offered her two songs, and she chose "Friday" because, as she said: "The other song was about adult love -- I haven't experienced that yet. 'Friday' is about hanging out with friends, having fun. I felt like it was my personality in that song."
Rebecca said:"Those hurtful comments really shocked me. At times, it feels like I'm being cyberbullied."
GLOSSARY
VIRAL (adj) very popular and spreading very quickly, especially on the Internet, e.g.:
Within weeks, her blog went viral.
INTERNET MEME: The termInternet meme(pronounced/ˈmiːm/, rhyming with "cream") is used to describe a concept that spreads via the Internet.
CYBERBULLYING: Cyberbullying is the use of cell phones, instant messaging, e-mail, chat rooms or social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter to harass, threaten or intimidate someone.
Please take some time to comment this topic, it's a nice opportunity to practice your English!
Do you like Rebecca Black's song ”Friday”?
Do you think some people's comments above are a kind of cyberbullying?
