The Year of the Dragon
As we say farewell to the Year of the Rabbit we greet the Year of the Dragon. And, with it, my whirlwind tour of global and local websites taking advantage …
Culture
The Year of the Rabbit
Lunar New Year is here and, with it, my whirlwind tour of global and local websites taking full advantage of this holiday. Here was my tour last year of the …
Language is a feature. It’s time more companies treated it as one
For many years, the addition of languages (as part of website localization) has ranked one of the least-promoted developments on any given website. Languages were added. End of story. Perhaps …
Do you speak Boganese?
Bogan is one of those Australian words that I still find highly entertaining, perhaps because I too am a little bit bogan. For example, boxed wine is known as a …
Adobe transforms the date picker into a world ready (and accessible) component
It might seem simple enough. You need to add a date input field to a submission page on your website. So you create a <form> element with <input type=”text”> and …
The top 25 global websites from the 2022 Web Globalization Report Card
I’m pleased to announce the publication of the 2022 Web Globalization Report Card. This is the 18th annual edition of the Report Card, and it reflects another difficult year. And yet …
Color trends, country by country, point to #serenity
Shutterstock recently published a global selection of color predictions. According to their blog, the predictions are based “millions of images downloaded from around the world, wherein each individual pixel shade …
Five reasons to avoid using maps on your website
Robert Frost wrote that good fences make good neighbors. Yet when it comes to virtual fences, visualized as maps, I’m not sure there is any way to create “good fences.” …
Singles day is coming! On many websites it’s already here
As I write this on November 5th, Singles Day (November 11th “11.11”) is nearly a week away. Singles Day is the world’s biggest shopping day, a virtual event that originated …
Taking emoji global: Google and Adobe
Two interesting posts to share about the globalization of emoji… GooglePolishing Up Emoji Emoji have a global audience and it’s important for them to be globally relevant. Pie emoji is …
Could China’s greatest threat be slackers?
Fascinating article in the New York Times about an emerging generation of Chinese who are pushing back against the 996 (9 am to 9 pm, 6 days a week) work …
COVID flattened the language curve, and that’s actually good news
I began the Web Globalization Report Card back in 2003. It became the first report of it kind to benchmark global websites and I’ve been publishing this report annually ever …
The top 25 best global websites from the 2021 Web Globalization Report Card
I’m pleased to announce the publication of the 2021 Web Globalization Report Card. This is the 17th annual edition of the Report Card, and it reflects a challenging year. Yet there …
Websites celebrate Chinese New Year: The Year of the Ox
This has become a bit of an annual tradition for me, taking a virtual tour of a number of global brands, seeing how they celebrate Lunar New Year (牛年), particularly …
Disney+ (or -) a few languages: Why companies continue to “assume the world speaks English”
The New York Times reports that Iceland has appealed to Disney to support Icelandic. And what began as a Facebook post by the country’s education minister has grown into a …