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<a href="http://www.emilytaylor.eu/2012/09/speaking-your-language.html#.UGCFoFGniSo">http://www.emilytaylor.eu/2012/09/speaking-your-language.html#.UGCFoFGniSo</a></h3><h3 class="post-title entry-title">Speaking your language
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Yesterday, the Broadband Commission published its <a href="http://www.broadbandcommission.org/Documents/bb-annualreport2012.pdf">2012 report</a>. Top of the pops on its <a href="http://www.broadbandcommission.org/Documents/bb-annualreport2012-flyer.pdf">highlights </a>document is the news that by 2015 Chinese will overtake English as the predominant language of the web. <br>
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This is a big change. In 2010, UNESCO's Assistant Director General, Janis Karklins, warned:<br>
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"<i>The Internet needs to become more inclusive and diverse with regards
to languages. There are approximately 6,000 languages in the world,
but 12 languages only accounted for 98 % of Internet webpages in 2008.
English with 72 % of webpages is the dominant language."</i><br>
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This year's report tells us that English now represents 27% of Internet
web pages, a huge swing towards multilingualism. There are 285
languages recognised by Wikipedia; Facebook is available in 70
languages. Amazingly fast progress on Internet content.<br>
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<table class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;text-align:center" align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align:center"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-v5LElOhoEq8/UGBy37h2PmI/AAAAAAAAACM/D4UFdfcp4Ho/s1600/Web+of+many+languages.png" style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto"><img src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-v5LElOhoEq8/UGBy37h2PmI/AAAAAAAAACM/D4UFdfcp4Ho/s320/Web+of+many+languages.png" border="0" height="230" width="320"></a></td>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align:center">Source: Broadband Commission Report 2012, page 63</td></tr>
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That's content. What about addressing? As the web becomes more
linguistically diverse, can the Internet's navigation system remain
predominantly English speaking? Internationalised Domain Names (IDN),
which allow users to find their way around the web in their own
language, have developed from relatively slow beginnings, and are
starting to become more widely available.<br>
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Many challenges to widespread deployment of IDNs - they are still not
consistently handled in web browsers, in email, or in popular
applications (for example, you can't create a Facebook account with an
IDN email), and there is limited awareness by industry and end users
alike. That said, some countries have seen good uptake of IDNs already.<br>
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The World Report on Internationalised Domain Name (IDN) Deployment, a collaboration between <a href="http://www.eurid.eu/">EURid</a> and <a href="http://www.unesco.org/">UNESCO </a>will
be published next month, and is summarised in the Broadband Commission
Report. As main author of the IDN study, I have spent a lot of time
this year trying to figure out why Internationalised Domain Names have
been so successful in some countries (eg Russian Federation and Republic
of Korea), and not in others. <br>
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Building on <a href="http://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/CI/CI/pdf/news/local_content_study.pdf">research by the Internet Society, UNESCO and the OECD</a>,
which finds a remarkable correlation between the development of network
infrastructure and growth of local content, the World Report on IDNs
suggests that a combination of country factors on the one hand, and
factors relating to the way that the country's domain name registry is
run on the other, combine to give a score for "IDN readiness".<br>
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<table class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;text-align:center" align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align:center"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qWVHy6ifwTo/UGBzL4vy3DI/AAAAAAAAACU/eEd0bbsg7jk/s1600/IDN+Readiness+matrix.png" style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto"><img src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qWVHy6ifwTo/UGBzL4vy3DI/AAAAAAAAACU/eEd0bbsg7jk/s320/IDN+Readiness+matrix.png" border="0" height="266" width="320"></a></td>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align:center">Source: Broadband Commission Report 2012, page 64 <br>
(EURid, UNESCO World Report on IDN Deployment 2012)</td></tr>
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Country factors look at cultural and linguistic homogeneity, the number
of language speakers in a country, the extent to which there are local
language versions of popular applications or sites (eg microblogging,
social networking, retail), and infrastructure. The link between
infrastructure and content is surprising at first, but thinking it
through - the faster your Internet connection, the more attractive it is
to go online, send emails, shop, watch videos, or create content.<br>
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The other factors which we think affect the uptake of IDNs in a country
or region relate to the way that the country's domain name registry
(ccTLD) is run. Factors such as price, and registration rules have
their part to play, but a crucial element is whether there is a network
of local registrars, who provide all sorts of Internet services to
people in their own language.<br>
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In this way, the country's domain name registry has an important role to
play in fostering the right environment for multilingual content.<br>
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It's in the nature of the Internet that fixing problems requires the
collaboration of multiple actors, and IDNs are no different. Policy
makers, industry and the technical community all have their part to
play. But looking at the growth in multilingual content, it makes sense
to suppose that there will be a market demand for multilingual web
navigation too, if it is user friendly, consistent and reliable.