Bonus points if there’s a known onomatopoeia to describe the sound.
“Bures” – javanese
Salt and pepper fight!
In Poland it was „śnieży” (snowing).
How’s that pronounced? Sorry for coming achoo with too many cultural questions
…and if you are interested in the sound of static rather than the image, then the Polish word is: „szumi”. This can be approximated in English as: ‘shoomy’. The ‘sz’ sound does sound like static.
The funny thing is that our ‘sz’ (in „szumi”) and ‘ś’ (in „śnieży”) usually sound exactly the same to English or French speakers, while for us they are quite distinct sounds.
I am not even able to write it phonetically in English. Ask Google Translate - its pronunciation is close-enough.
Back in the days when we all had antennas and cable hadn’t been born yet, the static stations were a great thing to watch if there might be a tornado in your area. Apparently if one formed, it would significantly change the look of the snow on the TV and give you a warning to quickly head to the basement. I never actually saw it happen, but there were a couple times we had local warnings and my parents plopped me down to keep an eye on the TV.
Never heard about this. Interesting tid bit.
I remember getting our first tv about 1982 I think.
I actually started questioning whether this was something my parent’s told me to keep me busy, but turns out it’s a real thing.
That is an interesting source. Thanks for the link!
In Germany it’s called “Weißes Rauschen” (so akin to white noise, white rustling / murmuring?). It seems to be both about the sound (rauschen) and the visuals (weiß).
“the war of the ants” (myrornas krig)
/Sweden
Know the term ‘Ants Soccer’, quite similar (Germany)
Ameisen Fußball? Never heard of that, super cool
Snow rain
… and sound was just called “hiss” or “white noise”
No. But I did learn that if you put your sunglasses over one eye and look at it, it makes a trippy 3D motion effect.
We called it “flies” or “snow”.
In Croatia, we call(ed) it ‘snow’ (snijeg).
Salt and pepper fight!
Snow or static. It’s cosmic microwave background radiation - the remnants of the big bang.
Some of it is cosmic background radiation - it’s also machine vibrations, manufacturer defects, power line radiation, and nearby appliances. The more remote and well shielded you are the more likely it’s pure background radiation… but in a big city it’s likely to be local radiation sources. The inverse square law has a big role here.
In China we call it snow and describe the sound using the exact onomatopoeia as rain
The sky above the port.
“Snow” in Norway.
