Adventures in web globalization, since 2002
Amazon recently added China to its global gateway. The link to takes you to Joyo.com, a company Amazon acquired over the summer. It will be interesting to see if Amazon attempts to “re-brand” Joyo as Amazon, or leave it as …
Here is an interesting Q&A with Peter Moore, global marketing chief of Microsoft’s Xbox. They have offered a subscription-based, online Xbox service for a couple years now and we find that Microsoft now offers the service in 24 countries and …
Linux developer Red Hat says it will add five new languages to its next generation of enterprise software – all Indian languages. Equally important, Red Hat plans to offer customer phone support in those languages. Although the company didn’t say …
This InfoWorld article cites a recent Gartner report that predicts that India will lose market share “from its current 80 percent to about 55 percent by 2007.” Who’s going to be nipping at India’s heels? Countries to watch include Ghana, …
CNET News features an entertaining article on some of the creative ways that Microsoft has offended people around the world through cultural and linguistic blunders. These anecdotes come from a recent presentation by a Microsoft executive, who is probably now …
The search engine war in China has long been heated, but Yahoo! recently upped the stakes with the launch of a new search portal: www.yisou.com. It sure looks a lot like Google’s search portal, underscoring the dramatic success Google has …
The Reveries Web site has an interesting piece on Whirlpool and its localization efforts in Latin America. Apparently the company has had great success in Brazil by creating a low-cost “people’s washer” with features unique to the marketplace. Here’s an …
According to a recent press release, last year more than 15 NBA teams incorporated Asian American marketing efforts into their overall marketing plans. And the timing isn’t due just to Yao; today, there are three Chinese players in the NBA: …
This is a great article about Procter & Gamble’s adventures in Russia. While currency devalatuations have been challenging, the economy has since stabilized and sales are growing at 50% annually (although revenues are still a fraction of US revenues). Products …
According to a recent study by the Pew Research Center, people around the world generally approve of increased international trade. They also “think positively” of international and multinational organizations, such as the World Trade Organization. (Respondents were not too fond …
Since its inception, ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) has been criticized for favoring the U.S. over other countries. But with a new president in office, Australian Paul Twomey — the first non-U.S. citizen to be president — …
Multilingual Computing has published a very useful supplement on best practices in Web globalization. You can download a copy here. The following is an excerpt from an article that I contributed: There is no such thing as “rest of world.” …
Amy Campbell alerted me to a very interesting graphic on the Google Zeitgeist page. It tracks the languages used to access Google over the past two years: Google handles more than 200 million queries a day from around the world. …
A great interview with Andy Chuang of Goodcharacters.com in Fresno, California. His company specializes in Chinese naming and linguistic evaluation. The interview was conducted by Steve Rivkin; here’s an excerpt: For example, Toshiba once had a commercial song in China …