English, of course. But maybe not for long….
From a CNET article titled U.N. delegates: English isn’t good enough: “Divina Frau-Meigs, who teaches at the University of Paris III (Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle), called for ’setting up a culture whereby you can use your own language, and that will be considered part of your human rights.’”
Until now, domains have been required to use English-language-only characters, meaning that alphabets in Cyrillic, Arabic, Kanji, or Chinese sinographs could not be used. But in recent weeks, delegates to a United Nations summit complained that “the ASCII-only choice was too English-centric and failed to respect other languages.”
“This new society leaves people isolated, marginalized,” said Adama Samassékou, a former Mali government official who is the president of the African Academy of Languages. “I think the digital divide is not as important as the linguistic divide. And that’s the one we should be bridging in order to guarantee the democratic governance of the Internet.”
So what’s up? Is this a good or a bad thing? Is it political correctness or the right thing to consider? What will be the result if Domains abandon a one-language-for-all technolgy to become inclusive?
lewis, i still have problem with english: i’m not able to foresee in which trouble i could be with mandarin or kanji.
as usual politicians look for the shortest way why they should look for the wiser way (eg: invest money in school and not in bombs or kalashikov)
Gianandrea,
Great comment and right on point. Do we really need the UN to get involved in the Internet?
I would love to hear what others think.
Hi Lewis,
My personal opinion is that the U.N. shouldn’t get involved in this matter. Period. The organization has proven to be totally ineffective in mediating weighty problems around the globe for quite some time now. Corruption runs rampant within its ranks besides. It’s disgusting! Why get involved in something else they can botch?
Thanks for bringing up this very important issue, Lewis. The English character-only requirement does make it difficult for a lot of people to use the internet, even if they just need to know enough to type the URL to get to a page in their language. I think it’s less political correctness than just plain old good marketing to allow businesses to have a URL that matches their actual name in their language or to make it easier for internet users to find those businesses. In the end, the characters just get turned into zeros and ones anyways, so it doesn’t seem like it should take too much tweaking to get the system to accept additional characters.
It seems like a person trying to play the political correctness card once again. I am not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I do not see how abandoning the one-language-for-all technology will do anything to improve the governance of the Internet when all words do not translate to the same meaning. Just looking at some headline news from around the world and could not help thinking should this be the focus of UN delegates with everything else going on?
Claire and Jeff, I think I am with you on this one.
Nedra, I hear what you are saying but whether right or wrong, English seems to be the most common of all languages. In other words, it is the first language in the US, Canada, Great Britain, Australia and New Zealand; lots of Latin Americans and Europeans learn the language; as do Japanese and Chinese.
Furthermore, what would keyboards need to look like if every alphabet was used? What other technical/manufacturing problems might we face?
Will lead to an internet world with more confusion. Maybe then there will be internet wars. I can’t think of any reason to support this.
if i may add some figures to make the un approach miserable:
-africa has 13% of the world population but only 1% has access to internet
-in all the continent there are the same numbers of phone lines than in tokyo
- in ghana there is a pc every 1.000 inhabitants
- the ratio between pro capita cost to accee to internet and gpd is
USA1,2%
Australia 1,5%
Japan 2,6%
Mexico 14,8%
Ethiopia 76,8%
Uganda 107%
S. Leone 118%
so what are we taking about?
It is fabulous to see such diversity in our commentators. Thank you.
Maybe I’m missing something, but I don’t see why our keyboards would have to change. We could continue to use English with our keyboards, and others who speak other languages can use the keyboards they already use with other character sets to access websites in their own languages. Just like in Microsoft Word, it’s easy to change between character sets if someone wanted to access a URL in a different language than what their keyboard is currently set for.
That said, I certainly don’t think the UN should get near the internet with a 10 gigabyte pole.
Hello, everyone.
Yes, great to see diversity among the commentators–but not the uniformity among their comments…. It’s a big world, and though we might think it revolves around an Anglo-Saxon axis, it doesn’t.
Is the Internet to achieve its potential as the great equalizer and help engender democracy worldwide… by compelling the world to learn English? A Pax Americana (I know, we’re talking about English, but we’re really talking about U.S. influence over the Net) seems to me as undemocratic in the virtual world as the attempts to impose it in the real world.
Nor can the Internet truly reach its potential if most of the world’s population has no access to it because the language of the Internet is English.
In any event, too many of the comments here seemed to me too categorical and unwilling to consider the possibility that the status quo may not be the best of all possible worlds.
Don’t get me wrong… I make my living as an editor, I love English, and I can’t countenance its misuse.
Seems to me, though, that assigning to it imperial ambitions over the virtual world is itself misuse, and a disservice both to the language and to those who deserve access to the Internet–and who may already confront onerous economic and societal obstacles.
Why not speak the language of your prospects? That’s what we do as marketers, isn’t it?
PS: Ann, great choice of graphics!
Nedra and Vahe,
Thank you for your comments. We do need to hear more differing points of view. Here is my response to your thoughtful comments:
Currently we can access any domain in the world because only one alphabet is used. We aren’t talking about Pax Americana. We are talking about alphabets. The alphabet we currently use is Latin (not English, not American).
Currently, the technology for full non-Latin addresses is still being developed. Once it is developed, how do all those who use Latin-alphabet characters (on keyboards) access a domain that is using non-Latin characters and vice versa.
According to newspaper reports, Patrik Falstrom, a Cisco Systems consulting engineer who is working on the project, said the venture is riddled with difficulties.
“We have 6,000 languages in the world,” Falstrom said. “So should we register the name of countries – like Greece – in all 6,000?”
“Falstrom said that fragmentation of the Internet – possibly through countries adopting systems based on separate languages – would destroy the Web’s basic usefulness. If that happens, people in China and the United States might reach entirely different Web sites if they typed in the same address, or a browser might not recognize the address at all.”
So, what seems like a diversity issue is really a technological and language one, and we need to understand that.
Most of us are not techies, and our access to the Internet is challenging enough. What do changes to the current system mean to usability?
Lewis … great discussion! You know, I don’t see the Internet as one big thing … more like lots of small and weird, connected Internets.
Look at China. What WE can see from outside is a very small amount of the content that is available. There is considerably more available from within China … whole Yahoo and Google equivalents with massive audiences.
Imagine the money that would need to be dedicated to a project like this — to create on-the-fly translation of URLs must be hugely expensive. Perhaps the money could be better spent on some other cause.
As with all technology decisions we need to ask ourselves — just because we CAN does it mean we SHOULD?
So, what seems like a diversity issue is really a technological and language one, and we need to understand that.
Exactly what I wanted to say.
And even if the technology exists who is going to implement this. Forget how much it will cost and think about the amount of man hours.
Okay so then someone figures out to automate the translations and download every language complete with slang.
It all seems like a sci fi film about computers taking over the world.
Yet again back in the 80’s the first time I used a teletype fax machine blew my mind.
So it will evolve as it evolves and the UN should keep their type happy fingers to themselves.
I was almost swayed by Nedra. And on a philosophical level I do agree with the concept of access for all. The reality is as Lewis points out…it’s really a technological issue.
Lewis,
First, thanks for the thought-provoking post.
For some reason, the following quote came to mind when I was reading your post and the various reactions to it: “England and America are two countries divided by a common language.”
And, I thought, some other Shavian observations might also shed light on this discussion:
“If you have an apple and I have an apple, and we exchange apples, we both still only have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea, and we exchange ideas, we each now have two ideas.” (The more we exchange ideas, with more people, the richer we are. The Internet helps us do that; we can make it do much more of it.)
“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. All progress, therefore, depends upon the unreasonable man.” (I love this one. Reminds me one of this week’s MarketingProfs articles, too: To Innovate–Break a Rule.)
“You see things as they are and ask, ‘Why?’ I dream things as they never were and ask, ‘Why not?’” (Surely the answer “it’d be too hard” isn’t really an answer, but an excuse.)
Credit where it’s due: George Bernard Shaw
I am moved by these comments.
English is fun to learn and for the foreign languages types we should have translations units. It’s a good way for more developers to make the money they are soooo worth.
Where do universal rights begin?
“In small places, close to home …. so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person; the neighborhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerned citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.”
– Eleanor Roosevelt
Universal Declaration of Human Rights topics briefed here:
1. We are all free and equal2. Don’t discriminate
3. The right to life
4. No slavery – past and present
5. No torture
6. We all have the same right to use the law
7. We are all protected by the law
8. Fair treatment by fair courts
9. No unfair detainment
10. The right to trial
11. Innocent until proven guilty
12. The right to privacy
13. Freedom to move
14. The right to asylum
15. Right to a nationality
16. Marriage and family
17. Your own things
18. Freedom of thought
19. Free to say what you want
20. Meet where you like
21. The right to democracy
22. The right to social security
23. Workers’ rights
24. The right to play
25. A bed and some food
26. The right to education
27. Culture and copyright
28. A free and fair world
29. Our responsibilities
30. Nobody can take away these rights and freedoms from us
I used and applied #27 recently in court and won a copyright issue.
Thanks for your post. It’s good to know the Human Rights so we are not taken undue advantage of.
Kathy
You guys are amazing. I love you!
Vahe, who could disagree with your thoughts? We should dream the impossible and work to make it possible.
Gavin, yes, where could we better put the money? After all, the internet is just a tool, albeit an important one.
Kathy, this might be a human rights issue as well. I chose to look at it from technological and usability points of view. Is the current system limiting the freedoms of some users? I don’t know.
Tammy, thank you for adding to my take on this.
“Most of us are not techies, and our access to the Internet is challenging enough. What do changes to the current system mean to usability?”
I think this is a key point. There are still plenty of users out there that swear by AOL as the best way to access the internet.
And I agree with Nedra when she says: “I don’t see why our keyboards would have to change. We could continue to use English with our keyboards, and others who speak other languages can use the keyboards they already use with other character sets to access websites in their own languages.”
I don’t see why this conversion can’t be done at the software and hardware level. And I certainly don’t see how getting politicians from any country involved would help!
Thanks Mack. I guess I am confused regarding the multiple use of keyboard characters. Currently, I access websites in Japan and Africa. I can do this because domain names use Latin characters, which my keyboard contains.
If that changes, how do I then access those sites in Japan and Africa, which will then use non-Latin characters in their domain names that my keyboard does not contain?
It may be a small thing and easily fixed; however, today’s Internet gives access to the entire world community. I fear that may change if we go away from the current standardization.
Lewis — I see that issue as a key reason why we have technology teams. (Right, Aaron?)
Seems that the important thing is to agree in theory that an English-only internet is limiting — to figure out the WHAT — and then turn it over to the techies to figure out the HOW.
Great discussion!
Great discussion, and most agree that the UN should stay back. Having said that, I appreciate the discussion about how to be more inclusive as life in cyberspace moves us forward.
It seems a great chance to build a stronger national and global community, and sometimes I think we miss that chance, through the fast pace we all keep to “keep up” at all…. Thoughts?
while i agree on the fact that from a tech point of view it may be reasonable to have different keyboards, automatic translators, etc and from a philosophical point of view everybody has the right to use their own language, problem is that millions of people do not have access to telephone lines, do not write and read their own language or dialect, do not have a foreseeable chanche to get to a school. and do not you think that the effort of learning a foreign language is key to open people mind towards new world and different attitudes?
Here’s a somewhat related news story>>>
well, that is “DARPA hard.”
http://tucson.cox.net/cci/newsnational/national?_mode=view&_state=maximized&view=article&id=D8L7KTD03&_action=validatearticle
http://www.darpa.mil/ipto/Programs/gale/
I love DARPA hard.
The most straightforward way to accomodate all the combinations/permutations of web site address descriptors/domain descriptors on the technical side would be to modify the DNS system that resolves URL’s to IP addresses (good luck with that).
As it becomes more imperative to use the Internet to keep from being left behind I imagine a number of governments and other NGO’s will seek to proliferate computing infratructure via initiatives like MIT’s affordable ($100 USD) Linux laptop (I’ve forgotten the actual name of this program).
I can see infrastructure loans from World Bank and IMF funding these types of projects. The technical “rosetta stone” for translation/interpretation of content will happen at the edge of the network rather than at the core. Hopefully it will arise as the result of an open-source effort that a community will undertake to provide a toolset for site creators to relatively easily offer multiple language versions of their core content.
Ann, Ellen, Gianandrea, Tammy and Mark:
Each of you added so much to this conversation. I thank you for your thoughtful comments and your input.
It might be better if the UN could see what everyone here has to say, before they move forward.
And why are Divina’s and Adama’s complaints expressed in English? If they’re oppressed and offended by English, why don’t they post or publish in their own language?
People who insult and disparage their tools aren’t worth our serious attention. And, of course, if they used their local dialect, they don’t have it then, either. Therefore they, and their arguments, can be safely ignored without risk.
A common, worldwide language is exceedingly beneficial. Today, it’s English. A hundred years from now, possibly Mandarin Chinese. Who cares? The important thing is to have one.
I do agree with you guys that this is more a matter of technology than cultural diversity.
I mean, let’s face it: Computers were (even though not invented but) popularized by the USA. Thus, keyboards all over the world have the latin alphabet, albeit some minor changes such as the adding of characters unique to a language or the rearrangement of certain letters. It is just a matter of definition. This is how it has been, this is how it still is.
I lived in China, and I was not surprised to see that they are also using the standard QWERTY keyboard. Ages ago the Chinese have adopted a method which allowed them to transcribe Hanzi into Pinyin. That is Chinese characters into latin letters. So did the Japanese, and probably most of the world’s cultures who are not using the latin alphabet by definition. Considering that there are thousands of Chinese characters, it would pose quite a challenge developing a keyboard that covers all this. For the Chinese, and I suppose many other non-latin cultures as well, it would be virtually impossible using a computer without having their language phonetically transcribed into latin characters. Thus, even given the case that URL standards will allow chinese signs to be used one day, the signs will have to be entered with a standard keyboard nevertheless.
I was sort of surprised that nobody really approached this topic from a marketing point of view.
Correct me if I am wrong, but I heard through the grapevine that it is actually in planning to allow special latin characters to be used in the URL. At least I heard that in my country, Germany, the introduction of the letters ä, ö, ü, and ß are the subject of debate. From a marketing point of view, on the one hand this would make it a lot easier for Germans and German speaking folks to relate, since they will finally be able to write a word as it is supposed to be written and not be required to transcribe it according to international standards anymore (such as using ae instead of ä). Nevertheless, the usage of special characters would also greatly impede business opportunities from outside the country. I can imagine a potential american customer of a small German business trying to access the company’s website and desparately looking for the letter “ö” in the character map, because he obviously neither has it on his keyboard nor knows the ASCII code for it. After 5 minutes of unsuccessful search (and I guess we all know just what a mess the character map is…) he gives up goes to a competing website which he can actually enter using his keyboard.
Great to see a discussion with such varied opinion, thought I would add my 2 cents or rather 2 paisa(Indian currency)
The Internet is a phenomenally enabling tool – it disseminates information like never before, helps connect people, has changed communication ….in short it has changed the way world works – in a manner of speaking.
While I apreciate the technological challenges, it hardly a reason not be for inclusive of other languages…afterall THERE is a world beyond America & England!!
And in this world people speak many different languages(In India itself around 20 languages are spoken widely!), and maybe a fair share of these people would be more drawn to the Internet in their language and thereby also benefit from it…
So if we accept that there is need to move beyond a English-specific Internet, we could start on figuring out a solution to the tech issues…rather than just throwing up our hands!!