But you have to be motivated to learn the language. Set aside the people who love learning for learning's sake (which is not everyone). With English being the d

But you have to be motivated to learn the language. Set aside the people who love learning for learning's sake (which is not everyone). With English being the default world language, and American media outside the Internet also typically in English, well, the motivation to learn a language probably isn't quite as strong here. The biggest advantage here would come from picking up Spanish. Live in a place with large Hispanic populations and you'll find plenty of media over here in Spanish in certain locations. It actually wouldn't be too difficult to immerse yourself somewhat. It's not surprising therefore that the greatest percentage of American bilingual speakers have Spanish as their other language (http://www.gallup.com/poll/1825/about-one-four-americans-can-hold-conversation-second-language.aspx http://www.gallup.com/poll/1825/about-one-four-americans-can...). I agree that media exposure can play a huge motivation. However, at least in the past, mainstream media in the United States was almost always originally in English. To use one example, in many other nations, foreign languages (English for sure at least) appear in pop radio hits constantly. In American pop music, in contrast, foreign languages rarely appear -- when present, they usually were one hit wonders, eg your "Sukiyaka", "99 Luftballoons", and "Amadeus" type songs. Obviously there are a few exceptions even "just outside" that mainstream circle (example: Rammstein) but "the norm" of US pop radio in the past was pretty much 99% English. I do wonder if this will change a little. I am hearing more foreign language lyrics in American pop songs (mostly Spanish); some foreign media forms seem at least cult popular (anime is an example of a foreign medium with a decent sized American subculture); and as you point out, the Internet allows access to far more media forms than you could get previously.