Peak flag: The decline of flags on websites has begun
I’m pleased to say that, based on the websites I study regularly, we’ve reached “peak flag.” In other words, at a high level, companies are now beginning to move away …
Web Globalization
What do the colors of your flag mean?
Wondering what the colors of a flag actually represent? Flag Stories includes an impressive collection, dissection and compilation of the world’s flags into a range of infographics. For instance, you’ll …
Verisign launches Hebrew .com domain
Verisign has owned rights to the .com domain for many years, and profited enormously. So it’s no surprise that the company has been eager to see continued profits from language/script-specific …
It’s time for your website to go flag free
If you are flying the Taiwan flag on your website, consider yourself warned. By China. As I’ve written many times over the past year, China is paying close attention to …
What’s the world’s most multilingual website? (2018 update)
A few months ago, I wrote an essay for Multilingual in which I noted that the world’s most multilingual website isn’t Google or Facebook or even Wikipedia. It is the …
Yet another reason to avoid using flags on your global gateway
As readers of this blog well know, I often refer to China and Taiwan when making the case for avoiding the use of flags on a global gateway. There are …
Welcome to the driver’s seat: Which automakers are doing the best job of welcoming female drivers in Saudi Arabia
It’s been a month since women have been legally allowed to drive in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and I wanted to get a sense for how this massive new …
To create a world-ready mobile app, think small, as in “lite”
If you don’t know what your mobile app weighs (in kilobytes), then it’s safe to say your emerging market strategy could use some tweaking. That’s not to be harsh, but …
Globalia illustrates why your global gateway should be in the header
Globalia is the leading travel company in Spain, generating 3.5 billion euros in revenues across more than a dozen brands. I visited the global website recently and noticed something missing …
Speaking in Tongues: Corporate America needs to get religious about languages
I was happy to have an essay published in the recent issue of Multilingual. In the essay I write: While Wikipedia, Google and Facebook are among the leaders in languages …
Deloitte: The best global professional services website of 2018
For the 2018 Web Globalization Report Card, we studied the following 6 professional services websites: Accenture Capgemini Deloitte Ernst & Young KPMG PWC Last year, Deloitte and KPMG tied for …
Think you can succeed in India supporting English only? Think again.
#serveinmylanguage It’s more than a hashtag; it’s a social movement. And it’s growing. A movement among Indian consumers to force the vendors who depend on their business to actually support …
Internationalization resources complements of the W3C
Successful website globalization is all about asking questions. A key point I stress in Think Outside the Country is that nobody knows everything. Nobody can know everything. And you should …
Country codes of the world. XL.
For quite some time people have asked me about creating a larger version of our Country Codes of the World map, something they could pin up in their conference rooms …
A unique look at the emerging multilingual Internet
I’m happy to announce that I’ve updated my map of the world’s internationalized domain names for 2018: The map includes all ICANN-approved country code IDNs for the world — more …