How big of an influence do i have on YOU

Well, by if by "i" u mean american alphabet, and by "you", you mean russia, then you have come to the right place. actually, i was just listenin to some russkoe radio, and they keep spamming their own website in "peklami" anyways. she say www.русскоерадио.pu (double u double u double u toch, russkoe radio RUU :wink: ) it sounds cute, but hermh ahem, anyways...
answer me these questions ...
1. do you people in russia, actually have to type WWW when going to websites ... even russian websites ? do regular people even know how to switch to american keyboard ? why dont u just use шшш or somthing ?

2. u already said, that just about everyone in russia regardless of age or class can read the latin alphabet (right?!) well, is this just somthing that they pick up from all the western influence that is all over ? or do you learn it in school ? ( i realized that some kids learn english in school, thuss they can read the latin alphabet) but, i know a couple russians who are my age, who have moved here in the last year or so, and do not speak any english, because in russia, they chose to study ukrainain... or some other non english speaking language, so, how did those kids learn the latin alphabet ? and let me appologize now to russia for the bombardment of western culture on you, i know it is probly anoying to have to type in letters that are not even in your language to go to a website :(, forgive my slovach country.

Errr... the Latin alphabet was originally a Roman script, and it is and has been used by dozens of languages since then, so what in hell makes it "American"?

i beleive i refered to it as latin... a few times.

And America = the new Rome

Nice to meet you, Dogboy!

A first, all people all over the world (as far as I know) have to use ONLY latin alphabet. And all Russian sites have to be named with latin letters ONLY. So the site of Русское Радио may be named as www.russkoeradio.ru or smth like that. All people who eever used a computer know hov to switch to latin keyboard (usually Ctrl+Shift or Alt+Shift)
Why dont we just use шшш or somthing ? Cause the URL ("uniform resource locator", the system of names) provides only latin alphabet.

About the knowledge of English in Russia. Many people can read and understand elementary English, because it is a compulsory subject practically in every school (as Maht or Chemistry). But the matter is that many pupills don't like to learn English, so they know very little of it.
People who study at special schools know English much better! For example, I'm 17 and I'm a fan of English, you can see I speak it fluently. [ :-) ] So do very many of my friends.
How did those kids learn the latin alphabet ? At school...
Dogboy: "I know it is probly anoying to have to type in letters that are not even in your language to go to a website" Not in general! Typing in English is such as usual as using a computer! Some years ago all computers in Russia undersood only latin letters in the names of files, and users couldn't even think about typing russian letters, cause there might be many troubles wiht the operating system.
Without knowledge of English you simply can't use all the opportunities of present technology all over the world. Especially in Russia.

Dogboy: "forgive my slovach country" No appologies are accepted! :-)

:D thanks dimon. your a super guy !

I think that Latin alphabet is perceived as a technical alphabet or so. It is used in mathematics ("a biciclyst riding from point A to point B" :)), in physics. etc. Sometimes Greek letters are also used, but very rarely. I remember I studied Latin alphabet when I was 7 y/o and I was reading a cover page of my dad's geometry book. BTW, a vast majority of Russians pronounce Latin laters (esp. when they don't refer to English language) in artificial "Latin" manner that is to some medieval European (German-French?) manner: а, бэ, цэ, дэ, е, эф, же, аш, и, йот, ка, эль, эм, эн, о, пэ, ку, эр, эс, тэ, у, вэ, дубль-вэ, икс, игрек, зет.
But now, with more knowing of English more letters are pronounced in English manner. I doubt very much that so many people say дубль-вэ, instead of дабл-ю for example.

yea,i just thought it was funny to hear that russian chick say www (double u double u double u ) and, i think i have seen a few ф's here and there in books and what not. but that was before i knew russian

Some of these chicks pronounce it "три дабл ю" or "вэ вэ вэ"

Like in the song:
"Вэ-вэ-вэ Ленинград,
Вэ-вэ-вэ точка ру!"
:D

i think we can thank the germans for that :(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dogboy182

i think we can thank the germans for that :(

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Definitely. Thank you, Germas! :) German alphabet (I mean, names of letters) is closer to Latin original and even to Russian, so it is sometimes used in URL's spelling, not to say in math etc. I personally like to say g - гэ, v - фау, w - вэ instead of жэ, вэ и дубль-вэ. It's just much shorter. And, at least in my environment, the most common way to pronounce www in URL's is вэ-вэ-вэ. Without dots! E.g. www.mail.ru [вэ-вэ-вэ мэйл ру]. Dots "точка" is pronounced only if it can be confusing and not obvious.

And I never heard English names of letters used in math or physics (in Russia). Only Latin. Greek is used quite often, too (e.g. any angular measurements).

And in chess. Ладья ходит жэ пять - жэ четыре.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Propp

Like in the song:
"Вэ-вэ-вэ Ленинград,
Вэ-вэ-вэ точка ру!"
:D

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Я тоже так думал. Это казалось мне странным - тока потом разобрал:
"вэ-вэ-вэ Ленинград эс-пэ-бэ точка ру"

greek is used in maths in Britain too, theta = unknown angle, alpha = proportional, omega is the physics sign for ohms..........

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Propp

And in chess. Ладья ходит жэ пять - жэ четыре.

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Things like "жэ пять - жэ четыре" most probably borrowed from French. (Or, at least, influenced by).

I had an American lecturer at university. On the first day he wrote some "translations" on the board:

theyda = theta (we say theeta)
bayda = beta (we say beeta)

I had trouble at first in Germany too (pi pronounced like "pee" rather than "pie") : the letters are all Greek, but it appears everyone pronounces the name of them differently! And then I went to Greece and learnt in modern Greek beta is veta (or something similar) anyway!

Can't forget Epsilon !