so who else has decided to learn German due to the number of German language posts?

just remember that ich_iel has a lot of fun with literal translations of english words which can lead to very weird german.

Nur erinnere, dass ich_iel ein Los des Spaßes mit literarischen Übersetzungen von englischen Wörtern hat, was zu seltsamen Deutsch bleien kann.

lmao bleien
- This will all just lead to an increase in suffering 😢
  Dies wird alles gerecht bleien zu einem innenschmalz in Leiderei 😢
- That's so metal 🤟

nie.

please be advised that speaking german properly is super fucking hard compared to learning many other languages, and you don't need german in germany for the most part.

when I'm in germany I speak my shitty, broken german and they respond to me in english

That's when you double down and tell them in German that you don't speak English. That'll confuse 'em.
- I, a white man, would love to learn to speak German with an Indian accent just to really fuck with 'em
- Fuck it i'll just speak spanish or french then.
- I once asked a German guy in Germany if he spoke German. On accident. When I was trying to ask him if he spoke English.
They probably speak English with you because your German is not sufficiently efficient.
My favorite phrase to use in all foreign countries is "Please forgive me, I am American." It gets a laugh out of almost everyone even when terribly butchered in any language and most people will then attempt English for you.
Except Parisians, who do not care. I think they would prefer I point and grunt to trying either English or my awful French.
- Thank you for differentiating between french and parisians.
Ja, wir neigen dazu, das zu tun.
- ICH WEISS
Failed successfully
Compared to other languages... If those other languages are Romantic, North Germanic, Dutch, Afrikaans, or Frisian. A majority of other languages are typically considered more difficult for people who only speak English.
That being said, I found Russian way easier than German at first, but that quickly stops being the case... German shares a lot of semantic/syntactic similarities with English so you can reasonably assume that a lot of German constructions will easily translate to English, for Russian though it's more unfamiliar and you have to put more effort into thinking Russian-y. The main thing that made German way harder at first is German declensions... ugh... Russian has a complex declension system but it's extremely regular, while German declensions are pretty irregular and the declension of articles is especially bad because their forms overlap a lot. Adjective declension is similarly bad. German word order also fucked with me a lot but it's decently rigid so you get it quickly.

Viel Spaß dabei!

I copy that and will increase production, if you ask I translate, you're welcome.

Sincerely, RatherMaybe.

Ich nicht.

Does anyone know what is the deal with the images (I assume it’s some kind of German meme) of people or characters with instant ramen on their head?

The noodles are just my signature. So just ignore the noodels. They have nothing todo with the meme directly. I just place them on the head of whoever in the meme is me.
- Haha all this time I thought it was some widespread cultural reference. Thanks for all the OC!
Might be the wrong answer, but I think it's kind of a signature of the creator... Sth with insta in his name
- Ding ding ding You are Correct!! :D All the memes with instant noodels are from me. Its my signature. :)
- @instantnudel@feddit.org one of the more prolific ich_iel denizens.
- It is
The auntiverse

I just blocked the communities 😅

du kannst rennen, aber du kannst dich nicht verstecken!
- God bless you?
Ich würde mich auch blockieren.
Deutschland vereinig dich gegen den unhöflichen Angelsachsen!

SPRICH

DEUTSCH
- DU

I was thinking about it for a while. The posts encouraged me. The prospect of possibly wanting to leave the US in the next year or two depending on things also makes me want to learn a second language.

1933: Moving to the US to escape Nazi Germany.
2025: Moving to Germany to escape Nazi US.
Come to Germany, we need more sysasmins (smart voters)

Number of German-language posts? I'm somehow not seeing those. I am however a native speaker of German already, so no need anymore to learn it.

Sort by Top Six Hours, and they will start showing. !ich_iel@feddit.de shows up frequently there.
- Now it will be !ich_iel@feddit.org

Deutsch ist gar nicht so schwierig. Versuch es doch einfach mal!

Bloß nicht c/ich_iel besuchen. Zangendeutsch kann Einen verrückt machen.
- War die erste Community, die ich blockiert hab. Erst auf .de, jetzt auf .org. So einen Blödsinn muss ich mir echt nicht geben.
Wenn ist das Nunstück git und Slotermeyer? Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!
- Try a little less Chaplin, and you are on a good way.

I'd be interested in learning, because German is the biggest contributor to modern English along with French. Of course the split happened long, long ago, but still...

It would have to be a couple years though, after I (knock on wood) am done getting to about B2/C1 on French.

German is the biggest contributor to modern English
Common misconception. English and German are West Germanic languages with a common ancestor, whose ancestor in turn is common among Norwegian, Gothic, Saxon, etc etc. The only influence German has now is the odd loanword, like Weltschmerz and Schadenfreude. English loaned a lot of words from French a thousand years ago because Norman was the substrate language in England a thousand years ago and is still a sort of prestige language. Dutch is much the same but you never hear anyone say that.
- The only influence German has now is the odd loanword, like Weltschmerz and Schadenfreude.
  Hahahahaha! XD
  Good luck, bro. (you're gonna NEED it)

I was learning it (super slowly, thanks ADHD) anyway, but it was when I finally read a 3-sentence long post and could read 90% of it without really thinking about it that I felt I was progressing at all

So of course I haven't practiced in weeks now, fuuck

Huh? Wo sind die posts? Where are they?

Wie Sie sehen, sehen Sie nichts.
Sagen sie dreimal schnell hintereinander: Streichholzschächtelchen
- Blaukraut bleibt Blaukraut und Brautkleid bleibt Brautkleid.
Obligatorisch: Dieser Kommentarbereich ist nun Eigentum der Bundesrepublik Deutschland.
Oder ist das nur so ein Reddit-Ding?
Schau in die Kommentare, ALLES Vollpfosten!

Don't learn german. As a german I always feel sorry for people who learn this language just for 80 million old people ^^

As a german I have to say learn whatever language you want, even if nobody speaks it.
- Ok, I'm learning QBASIC
Someone forgets the existence of other countries where people speak German

Ja, das habe ich

Viel Erfolg!
- Danke

What are you subscribed to, to be seeing that many?

I think I've seen a couple tops in recent memory.

Depends on how you sort. If you sort by "top of last 1/6 hours" you will see lots of stuff from other languages.
I browse by All with the Hot sort.
I see German posts constantly. I think because they might not be language tagged correctly?
- Not making the language tag mandatory is one of the bigger lost chances of Lemmy. I can't even select it in my client.
- Or not really to feel bothered to change it to something else.
I have set mine to show me all and sort by new by default, lol. (If I get bored I may temporarily chenge to hot and top.)

I find it hard to imagine learning a language that I don't foresee myself using at least once a week IRL

I've tried learning French and German but honestly I very rarely encounter speakers of those languages and can count on one hand the number that didn't also speak English.

I've been learning Spanish though for nearly a year to great success.

Du muss nicht unbedingt sprechen um eine Sprache zu benutzen. Du kannst auch z.b. Medien anschauen auf der Sprache, oder lesen. Das letzte Mal, dass ich jemanden zum Englisch sprechen hatte war auf einer Hochzeit, ist also auch eigentlich sehr selten.
- Por supuesto que si, tienes razón. Pero si solamente quieres aprender un idioma, cualquier idioma, generalmente es mejor si tienes un uso práctico.
  Pero si tienes ganas de aprender un idioma particular, por favor aprendes de todos modos si tienes un usó o no.
This is why I struggle with the languages I want to learn. No use for them in the fay to day though I am sure I could find more German speakers than Scottish Gaelic
Now get this. I live in Montreal and three years in I can still barely understand français québécois, despite being immersed in it.
Latin languages seem to be my nemesis.

A better reason to learn it is that anything you say in German sounds like swearing.

Mein Hovercraft ist voll von Aalen!

Too many Hollywood movies m3in Freund.
- Yeah. Once I overheard someone chatting behind me while in a train. I knew it was in German because I've learnt some long time before. It was the cutest (presumably romantic) conversation I've ever even though I didn't understand much. Before that I've always thought French sounded the nicest, but that conversation shattered my belief.
  A while later, I went to Germany to visit friend. While at a museum I read out loud some descriptions on items there. He told me I spoke like in films, even like Hitler. Hearing him talking with family, it was very casual and there was no sudden change of intonation like in movies. I somehow realized stereotype in movies ruined my perspective on the language.
Holy heck that is an oooooold MAD-Magazine reference. xD Kudos my good sir!
- An old Monty Python reference. 😀

No, but I've seen a few French posts (nowhere near as much as German) and it's been a good chance to practise my French.

I took spanish in school but if I had to do over would have likely done french but german is second choice.

Not only because of that, but it was definitely a factor.

I know some German (B1), but it's been a few years since I had classes and those posts help me brush up my German (though they are a bit advanced for my level).

Trouble with ich_iel is that they usually translate English words literally into German. Even names or English words that exist in German. The worse the translation the better.
So, uh, don't learn everything from them.
- What, my first dialect of German shouldn't be epic memer?
- My favorite is using "Windleitblech" for spoiler.
- How can you do Zangendeutsch/Denglisch like that?
- So, uh, don’t learn everything from them.
  It could be worse. Like using a cat as a training partner for language learning.
  ...I'm still trying to unlearn "Miaument".
I doubt the issue is your ability to speak/read German but the heavy use of Zangendeutsch.
- Why would anyone do that😔
  (Tnx for the site btw)

Do people use language settings? I have mine set to include German so I don't know if turning it off would actually filter out many of these posts.

Oh, I should probably play with those, as I see no German posts at all.
- Since feddit.de is dead, you need to visit some DE-related communuties on feddit.org like DACH and ich_iel :)

Nie

I've been learning German for a few years (very slowly) now with Duolingo. I see a lot of Spanish posts too (especially on masto) and have been enjoying how the fediverse encourages me to work on my languages.

I lived in Germany from '83 to '94, but I never did learn to speak much of it since I went to American schools. Apparently most Germans speak decent English now? That would have been nice back in the day!

English is on the curriculum of all schools as a mandatory subject, but learning it in school =/= speaking proficiency. That usually comes with a ton of practice, and not all that many of us are exposed to English on a daily basis, even less so in lower income strata.
- I've just read that a lot lately, that most people speak English relatively proficiently there. Back in the 80s and 90s it was somewhat rare. Possibly the internet helped a bit.

I haven't seen a single one, so nicht ich.

My phone translates anything on screen in more or less real time. If the post looks interesting I can read it no matter the language.

What phone is that?
- I do the same thing with my Pixel, but I assume it's all Android phones. I just hold down the power button on my phone for a second then click Translate. It works pretty well for most of the German memes.
- Pixel phones have a "feature" by pressing the home button long (which usually activates the assistant) it will activate a sort of screen reader.

I use catodon.social and it's got a ton of German speaking people, and while Catodon is very very well designed it doesn't have a translation option yet.

I started way before I came here but the posts are nice, the comments are really good cause they tend to be longer/more in depth

It's a good thing I already know a little German!

Maybe I am missing a joke but that sounds very little like high german and more like a heavy accented or dialect version like swiss-german or austrian-german.
- Its gibberish, supposed to be East German. It's from Top Secret, still a cool movie

... What German posts?

Lemmy tags all posts with the language they are written in. Most clients filter any posts not of your selected languages by default. Hence, there is a good chance you never notice German posts.
- Oh, yeah, I forgot about that setting. Since that specific setting says, "If you deselect Undetermined, you will not see most content," I just assumed most people didn't select a language when they post. Since I still have "Undetermined" selected, I'd assumed I'd still see some foreign language posts.

Mark Twain wrote an essay about The awful German language

Nah, "block instance"works just fine. I already took 4 years of Spanish as a kid and didn't remember that, why add another language to suck at?

Maybe because 4 years aren't much? It's nice to be fluent in foreign languages, and known to be good for your brain (delaying / preventing Alzheimer's for example)