Our Dream & Vision

Rome……                                                                                                                                                                                           What if it were the Romans teaching you? 

When in China, speak like the Chinese. Wouldn’t you like to learn a language the way it’s meant to be spoken? What if teachers were available to you right in the comfort of your living room, while they taught you from the comfort of theirs, thousands of miles away? What if your native speaking teachers could choose what to teach you, from their rich cultures, completely free of textbook syllabus and “canned” teaching methods?  

Giordano wants to outfit a “World without Strangers.” We want to facilitate a world without communication barriers, a world without cultural differences and prejudices. Think what the best minds of both worlds can accomplish, from idea exchange, from communication. You might think the Voice of Such Idealism is Way Too Out There. But in a sea of common voices, who writes the extraordinary dissent? We have a dream, of kids making friends here and growing up cutting big business deals together. And how do they make contacts without being able to communicate with one another, to share their dreams and ideas?  

We want native speakers of the two most widely spoken languages in the world to teach each other their respective native tongues. And to make friends along the way. There are some 1500 Chinese dialects, tens of thousands of Chinese villages. In a nutshell:

Mandarin: 7 dialects, 42 subdialects
Jin: 8 dialects
Huainan: 5 dialects
Wu: 6 dialects, 13 subdialects
Xiang: 3 dialects
Gan: 11 dialects
Min: 2 languages, 6 dialects, 9 subdialects
Hakka: 8 dialects
Cantonese: 8 dialects
Pinghua: 2 dialects

Total: 11 languages, 64 dialects, 64 subdialects  

This is by no means an exhaustive list.  Which do you think your textbook is teaching you?  

Dream No.1 (share language knowledge for the next generation):   

In order to preserve chinese language and culture, we hope to capture as many different dialects and contributors from as many parts of China as possible to be passed on future generations.  My 6 week old son is a mixture of Hakka, Hokkien and Straits-born Chinese stock.  Someday I hope he logs on to ECpod and learns to speak some of these dialects the way they were meant to be spoken, not just the watered-down phrases his parents sometimes throw back and forth around the house. 

ECpod will not be deleting these video clips.. The clips will always be stored in Archives as our database grows.  Someday, ten, twenty years down the road, maybe my son will laugh at the funny fashions contributors of these videos wore,  Maybe he’ll even notice the furnishings and surroundings of the contributors as they make those videos, right in their living rooms or schools…  

Dream No. 2 (build a strong community through an open platform):

ECpod hopes to make the world a smaller place.  Cyberspace can be awfully lonely, if you access 1.5 billion Chinese but you just don’t speaka da language.  Via ECpod, you can get in touch with anyone by sending them an email or commenting on their videos (also through other functions coming soon – watch this space).  It is an open platform for you to make friends outside your regular circle…The ECpod platform is available not just in English, but also in Mandarin to facilitate Chinese users of the site as well. 

We want our members to feel a sense of belonging to the ECpod community as this platform is created for them. They make up the community and without their help in the form of video contributions and usage of this site we would not be able to build this together…Only with this sense of belonging will the ECpod community start to grow and benefit all its users.

Dream No. 3 (making learning fun):

We hear people complain about how boring it is to learn a language by attending classes, commuting back and forth to school, reading from text books etc… Nowadays with the advantage of internet and the development of video streaming, ECpod is made possible as a platform for learning a language in a more enjoyable way. You can’t learn colloquialisms from textbooks.  And you can’t soak up the culture from a classroom.  If spending 6 months in a village in China is not an option, there’s ECpod.  

ECpod welcomes mistakes and colloquialisms in the contributed clips (highlighted by our inhouse language tutors) in the interests of encouraging a more genuine, warm feeling – users are ultimately being taught by other users from all walks of life. If you are a beginner and need some guidance, you can always put up a video asking questions or inviting a native speaker to correct your pronunciation.  Through such interaction, you will better learn the language and perhaps make a friend or two at the same time. 

Conclusion:

ECpod is meant to be a community and we count on you to build it up with us. In the near future ECpod will evolve and more features will be added, but our concept and mission remain the same – everyone shares their native language and culture.  It’s fun to get involved while we are still in the early development stages and we are working on a blank piece of paper now.  Nothing is set in stone that cannot be changed with a little feedback, and no one has built such a platform before.  We want to do our best in innovating and expanding this site. 

You are free to think of new ways to make this website a better tool for everyone – we build this site for you.  If you do not use it, ECpod would cease to exist.  It is therefore in our best interests to ensure you have an enjoyable learning and contributing experience.  ECpod is, first and foremost, a place to share your culture, make friends and exchange ideas. The teaching materials are contributed by people like you, who hope you will teach them your culture and language too. 

If you share this dream, please join us.  You may get in touch with us via email (contact at ecpod.com) or a comment on this blog.  We would love for you to be a key member of this project.  Together we can build the largest video library teaching English and Chinese.  

Written By:  The  ECpod Dreamer