Being hard of hearing (severe to profound), I can relate to much of the OP's post. I use hearing aids, but communication is still challenging. I also rely on watching who is speaking for lip-reading, facial language, and body language; putting those together with what I hear creates a "complete" input for me. For TV, I rely on captioning, and on subtitles for DVDs. I don't listen to the radio, or much music.
The web is great for communicating and learning because it's very visual, but podcasts and screencasts, despite possibly being of interest, aren't much good to me.
I prefer to do most conversing in person; over the phone it's far too easy to miss something, or confuse one sound or word for another (letters: b, c, d, g, e; numbers: 15, 50 (pronunciation)). Heavy accents are quite challenging to handle over the phone. I've had to have another person help me with telephone calls for official things such as banking, gov't matters, etc.
I'm a university student. In small classes hearing isn't too bad, but larger classes in lecture halls are much harder to follow. It's easier when the teacher is doing most of the talking, and harder when it's a more interactive class, with students contributing.
In a working context, clear communication is important. Even in person it's easy to miss a key word or phrase, or confuse one for another. Not only that, but I once interviewed for a web developer position, and was openly discriminated against when my hearing difficulty was revealed. The interview didn't go past this point; I could have done the job with my skill set, but the boss made an issue out of my hearing.
I'm a very visual person: I like to see, to read, to write, and to draw. Being an avid reader, I enjoy novels and other reading materials, including the web. I'm mostly self-taught in web development by reading tutorials and books and reviewing code by other people.
In closing, loss of hearing, whether partial or complete, raises barriers to work, education, socializing, etc. They can be worked around to some extent, but they are still they, and as I found out can actively harm you.
The web is great for communicating and learning because it's very visual, but podcasts and screencasts, despite possibly being of interest, aren't much good to me.
I prefer to do most conversing in person; over the phone it's far too easy to miss something, or confuse one sound or word for another (letters: b, c, d, g, e; numbers: 15, 50 (pronunciation)). Heavy accents are quite challenging to handle over the phone. I've had to have another person help me with telephone calls for official things such as banking, gov't matters, etc.
I'm a university student. In small classes hearing isn't too bad, but larger classes in lecture halls are much harder to follow. It's easier when the teacher is doing most of the talking, and harder when it's a more interactive class, with students contributing.
In a working context, clear communication is important. Even in person it's easy to miss a key word or phrase, or confuse one for another. Not only that, but I once interviewed for a web developer position, and was openly discriminated against when my hearing difficulty was revealed. The interview didn't go past this point; I could have done the job with my skill set, but the boss made an issue out of my hearing.
I'm a very visual person: I like to see, to read, to write, and to draw. Being an avid reader, I enjoy novels and other reading materials, including the web. I'm mostly self-taught in web development by reading tutorials and books and reviewing code by other people.
In closing, loss of hearing, whether partial or complete, raises barriers to work, education, socializing, etc. They can be worked around to some extent, but they are still they, and as I found out can actively harm you.