While we are here sending messages in English, there are at least one thirdof the worlds population who can't read them, for English is not even a secondlanguage for them.
I refer to China.
More people in China are logging on to the net every day, but most of whathas been put up on the net is in English, this can be very frustrating for them.
Very few web sites I visit, and I visit very many in any given week, don't haveany way of giving translations into other languages, and I feel, this is a thingthat webmasters have got to address as soon as possible.
On my own website, www.ebook-sales.com I have inserted a script code atthe top of every html page to offer Alta Vista's translationservice - 'Babel Fish'.This offers translation into eight languages at present, including Chinese,Japanese, and Korean, as well as European languages. As morelanguages become available automatically the script will activate them.
Since I put "Babel Fish' on my site I have noticed in the stats on my server that more people are logging on from China!
This problem of translation for web-sites I recently wrote up about in a article filed with IdeaMarketers.com called "Reach Out And Touch Billions", no soonerit was filed within minutes it was being read by users of the service, usuallyeditors.
Take a look at the article and let me have some comments, and if you knowof other translation services, why not give me some details about them forothers to benefit from?
Question 1.
Should it be a mandatory requirement that a translation should bemade available for web-sites - incuding blogs?
Question 2.
Now that there is the technology available, should search engine'slike Google and Yahoo rank sites lower if they have no translationavailable?
(Therefore rank sites higher if they do provide translation?)
Question 3.
Should all email service providers be made to provide translationservices for all emails?
(Do you know of any that do?)
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Tony Dean is a publshed author and writer of ezine articles. He
runs a web site at:- http://www.ebook-sales.com
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