Adventures in web globalization, since 2002
In the recent Globalization Insider newsletter, there is an excellent article by Chuck Wrobel about managing names across different scripts. This is a real challenge for multinational organizations, and it affects many departments – Web, marketing, customers service, accounting. He …
According to this interesting Dow Jones article, Coke is recently launched a new beverage in Argentina that takes advantage of the local fondness for the yerba mate plant. Called Nativa, the drink is designed expressely for the market and none …
It is becoming much more common for companies to issue press releases after adding another language (or locale) to their Web sites. For example, Swagelok, a maker of “fluid system components,” issued a release last week that said: Swagelok expanded …
AT&T boldly announced today that it had launched a seven-language Web site at www.att.com/global. I’ll give AT&T and ‘A’ for effort and a ‘D-‘ for execution. The major problems have to do with navigation, or lack thereof. If you visit …
A.T. Kearney, Inc. and Foreign Policy magazine recently released their list of the top 20 most global countries. The survey takes a number of factors into account, such as politics, travel, technology and economic integration. This is the second year …
HIP Health Plan of New York today announced that it has added a fourth language, Korean, to its Web site: www.hipusa.com. Now the press release isn’t entirely honest. It says that Korean is the “fourth” language is in addition to …
According to this article, the government is in need ofa few (or few hundred) translators of Arabic, Farsi, and Pashto. Here’s an excerpt: The government is looking for linguists who can decipher both classified and sensitive material, said Everette Jordan, …
To succeed in software these days, you need really tight alliances and Idiom’s “go it alone” approach over the years has cost it dearly. The latest warning flag came in the form of a press release from Idiom issued today. …
The San Antonio Express-News has an article on the growing number of bilingual (English and Spanish) ads. Here’s an excerpt: There are “more Latinos in the United States than there are Canadians in Canada,” Sosa said. The Census Bureau has …
This very interesting article is not about China but about the EU Parliament, and how it intends to manage its ever-increasing number of languages. As the EU expands, so does the number of languages its governing organizations must support. Here …
For anyone who says that globalization is a one-sided game in which American is always the winner, I submit Kola Real. Kola Real, known formally as Industrias Ananos, is giving Coca-Cola a run for its money south of the U.S. …
In a recent press release, ICANN, the organization in charge of the chaos that is our domain name registration system, has made multilingual domain names a priority (again). Here’s what the press release says: ICANN announced it will launch a …