July 18, 2004
Orkuters chateados com os brasileiros? : A note on linguistic displacement and online social networks
by Liza Sabater
Yahoo! News - Brazil Internet Craze Angers English Speakers and Many-to-Many: Brazilian vs. USAian Throwdown on Orkut, via Slashdot | Language Tempest At Orkut.
When the average Orkut user goes to look at community listings to see what's out there, he'll see a list populated with pretty much all Portuguese communities," Gibbs said. "This is highly frustrating since Orkut is not a Brazilian service."
This is such an ignorant statement and YET so typical of the clueless in this country. I can't even begin to tell you how I still reel whenever I hear or read statements like this. It is the freaking 21st century people, wake up and smell the multilingüismo. Makes me want to pop a few more of them latino babies to just screw around with those census numbers.
I had a mini-revelation about this back on May at the NYC Bloggers Meet. I asked both Jason Calacanis and Nick Denton if they had any designs on non-English speaking markets and both had a resounding NO. Interesting, I thought, given that the month before Adam Seifer and Scott Heiferman of Fotolog.net mentioned how their users went to being mostly from the US to being over 50% Brazilian (nowadays it's more like 47%).
Those numbers are no small pickings and, given Denton and Calacanis' one-upmanship on the "I'm going to make millions on this blogging thing" show, it struck me as odd (even naive) that these guys were not looking south of the border or, for that matter, beyond US borders.
For one, Brazil just and of itself is quite frankly a HUGE potential market. It's as big a country as the US, yes, but it also has an eager and (most probably) higher percentage of Bra$$$ilian internet users compared to their U$ counterparts. The other more obvious reason is that, no matter what, the Internet has no borders. Save the drivel about localization and personal sites/blogs being for the immediate family. If it is on the web, someone, somewhere is bound to find it. I can create a blog about a block party in my neighborhood. If it is a public and googleable site, people in Hong Kong might be reading it while I sleep. Why? Because it is on the web. Assim de simples é.
So to say that a community / social networking site such as orkut is not a Brazilian service , is the most stupid thing any user could say and, quite frankly, goes to show the lack of cosmopolitan sophistication on the part of the dissatisfied orkuter --am going to refrain my generalization to all Americans but, by grock, the trying is hard these. GW BUSH ANYONE?
More importantly though, it goes to show the lack of cultural and linguistic strategies on the part of the developers of Orkut. Even if they choose not to create a separate version of the site for each language or country, I highly doubt they'd ever see the day when English was not the network's "average" language.
Nor have they probably accounted for the fact that some or many members might speak more than one language. Wouldn't it be neat to be able to translate your Orkut page and communications in all the languages you speak so that you don't have to do the work yourself? How cannot language preferences be an integral part of the interface? Why not show off how many languages I speak through the interface; making it possible for people to network beyond their "native" linguistic walls? For crying out loud, GOOGLE ALREADY HAS A TRANSLATION ENGINE! Put it to dang good use, I say.
But wait! Can I easily go to a localized Google site? Absofuckinglutely NO! Even though they have the translation page, it's design does not lay bare the fact that at the end of the page you can go to national and/or regional Google sites. The usability of that page actually sucks --even if it is as ugly as anything coming from Jakob Nielsen. I can't easily and fluidly move from one Google country to another.
OK, note to GOOGLE :
HIRE ME AS A LINGUISTIC ARCHITECT & CULTURAL STRATEGIST
There, I said it. Not only do I speak four languages (Spanish, English, Portuguese & French), I can read Italian and Català. I would love to work building strategies for interactive sites. I'd make them more atuned to their potential trans-national users by using linguistic trees or families as building blocks for the development of services and the structuring of interface design.
Back to earth now.
I highly recommend all to go and take a look at the discussion back at Slashdot | Language Tempest At Orkut. Here are some of the most interesting (unedited) comments:
#It would be interesting to observe on behalf of the orkut engineers the relations between the English speaking and the Portuguese communites to see the people who act as bridges between the communities because they are bi-lingual. Such people have an important role in society and the website just shows one of the current realities in life - communication
#Why should .com be American? The .us (and all the other country-code TLDs) were created for a reason. I would say .com, if it exists at all, should be aimed towards more international things.
#What really happened, IMHO, is that at this particular moment Brazilians were ready to jump into it - they liked the invitation and networking mechanism more than other people and answered by inviting everybody they knew, creating something the world hasn't yet saw, an international Internet application where the Americans are not the majority.
#Here's one way of thinking about it. It seems the article is talking about users complaining that in a forum that started out as English, Portugese comments get posted and the language shifts to Portugese. I tried to imagine this happening on slashdot (for example, on this thread). At first I thought it wouldn't be any big deal. But then I thought, what if I was following a thread on slashdot, and suddenly it switched to Portugese. It'd be kinda like threadjacking. It's annoying to read an English thread, then someone posts a response in Portugese, because then I can no longer follow the thread. I'd like to read what that person said, but I can't. And any Portugese speaking people who were commenting would probably switch to Portugese if they posted any more comments too. Maybe I'll post something in English, and the response will be in Portugese. It really comes down to netiquette. Sure they have a right to comment however they want, it's just not polite to switch languages mid-stream. If you reverse roles (e.g. suppose I can read Portugese) and I post English comments in a thread that's all Portugese, then people start switching to posting in English, that would leave out all the Portugese-only people. Although creating a separate area may help somewhat, a better solution to the problem is just informing users how to behave better. If it was common knowledge, the community would police itself and frown upon that kind of behavior. I know polite internet conversation seems like an oxymoron to many, but for all the trolls and BS that gets posted on slashdot, it's pretty readable, and well-thought out arguments still happen.
# ...The Brazilians with internet are the more privileged portion of the population (even if they aren't rich, they can read and write and most likely don't live in shacks) whereas in the US, plenty of uneducated folks have high-speed internet. Most likely, the Brazilians on Orkut have had expensive educations are English was required at their schools. And even if it weren't required, they'd have to know how to speak enough English to communicate with Americans on ski trips to Aspen.
So I think you're both right and wrong. Americans live such insulated lives (the US is a huge country, and some people rarely encounter individuals that don't speak English) that there is less evident need for them to learn foreign languages. But even in places like Texas, where over a third of the population is Latino (and many speak no English at all), few Texans bother to learn Spanish. There is an urgency for Brazilians to learn English, but no urgency for Americans to learn Portuguese. People learn English partly because they want to communicate with English-only speakers, and partly because of the opportunities available in the extremely wealthy US, where poor people may eat Velveeta and white bread, but they don't starve (unless they're kids with negligent parents).
Things are really going to get interesting when the US Latino population gets big enough and rich enough so their presence can't be ignored, both on the web and in real life. What are all you monolinguals going to do when that happens, huh?
Estadounidenses, you've gotta get your groove on and get those línguas in shape because, if the revolution will not be televised, it will most certainly not be broadcast in English either.
Precisam prestar atencão!
Posted by Liza Sabater in Brazil, Commerce, Culture, Ethnicity, Language, Latino, Media, Politics, Portuguese, Social Networks
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Say it loud, say it proud!
I was pleased to see this pop up on my Bloglines this morning; I've seen a few other posts on this issue that make no sense to me at all. It is a little annoying to have to delete a series of messages from my Orkut inbox that are in a language I can't read -- but I bet lots of folks who don't speak English have the same annoyance.
There must be some simple software solutions for this entirely joyful problem -- what?? People from all over the world are using the same service? Maybe even trying to talk with each other?
Glory be!
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Comment by: liza at July 19, 2004 01:30 PM
can you give us some link love and show us the way?
most appreciated will be
[i'm channeling yoda today]
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Comment by: alizinha at July 19, 2004 01:41 PM
Thanks for bringing this to my attention, as I knew nothing of the conflict that had arisen within Orkut-world. Due to my Brazil fascination, I was intensely curious to read about this and I enjoyed your take on it. I pretty much agree with most everything you had to say.
It's funny, because just the other day I had a new acquaintance (who is a USAer) ask me why so many Brazilians do photoblogging. She thought it was cool, and didn't have a problem with it, but it got me to thinking about why it had caught on in Brazil so strongly. I came up with these reasons: (1) it's a huge country (5th largest pop. in the world), (2) it's a YOUNG country (average median age much younger than U.S. population), and (3) it's a sociable culture. I think Brazilians' sociability has led to the very quick, seemingly faddish spread of Fotolog and Orkut. And that should be commended and admired.
I'm so NOT surprised, by the way, that Denton and Calacanis were/are overlooking the money-making potential of the non-English-speaking audience for blogs. So when do you and I go into business, chica, with some Spanish and Portuguese-language blogs??
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Comment by: Rafael at July 19, 2004 07:06 PM
Bem, pra ser mal-educado, eu vou postar o comentário em português. ;)
Why should .com be American? The .us (and all the other country-code TLDs) were created for a reason. I would say .com, if it exists at all, should be aimed towards more international things.
Ih... Não é, não? :)
A verdade é que aqui sempre se viu o .com. o .net e o .org como uma espécie de passaporte para a internacionalidade. A "norma", no entanto ainda é o .br.
What really happened, IMHO, is that at this particular moment Brazilians were ready to jump into it - they liked the invitation and networking mechanism more than other people and answered by inviting everybody they knew, creating something the world hasn't yet saw, an international Internet application where the Americans are not the majority.
Acho que isso talvez reflita uma certa diferença entre as culturas brasileira e americana. Para nós, quanto mais gente estiver em nossas friendlists, melhor. Somos cordiais, como diz o Sérgio Buarque de Hollanda. Eu, particularmente, ainda não consegui ver muito sentido no Orkut, e esse jogo parece ser a verdadeira razão de ser. Talvez os brasileiros, por sua forma de se relacionar com a comunidade em geral, tenha percebido isso instintivamente, como disse a alizinha. Sei lá.
Most likely, the Brazilians on Orkut have had expensive educations are English was required at their schools. And even if it weren't required, they'd have to know how to speak enough English to communicate with Americans on ski trips to Aspen. (...) People learn English partly because they want to communicate with English-only speakers, and partly because of the opportunities available in the extremely wealthy US, where poor people may eat Velveeta and white bread, but they don't starve (unless they're kids with negligent parents).
Isso não é exatamente acurado. Aprende-se inglês aqui porque há uma percepção generalizada de que as melhores oportunidades de trabalho dentro do Brasil são reservadas a quem fala inglês. A maioria das pessoas que falam um inglês decente sequer conseguem sonhar em ir para Aspen. Mas isso me parece ter sido escrito por um brasileiro. :)
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Comment by: twhid at July 19, 2004 09:19 PM
I did some freelance work for a fairly well-known photoblogging service and they had the same issue -- tons of Brazilians. They used a strategy of design to attempt to balance the membership by highlighting different geographical regions. Not sure if it worked.
Are Brazilians simply social-software crazy right now or what?
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Comment by: Mauricio at August 4, 2004 10:44 AM
It’s so funny to read a discussion like this on the web. Believe me or not, this reflects the way things happen in the world. Of course, we can’t generalize, but most of American people tend to see U.S as the center of the universe and don’t see some trends emerging (I wont say a word about Bush or Imperialism mambo jumbo…). I agree that if a discussion is in English, it’s not polite to switch it to Portuguese. But it makes me wonder, do the (majority of) Americans do not speak a second language, or just are not interested in other countries? It’s probably both. While we see the all world connecting, you also see U.S trying to avoid that. It’s not only English that Brazilian people are learning, it’s Spanish (yes, Spanish, because Spanish and Portuguese are not the same, in fact are very different, and muchacho, chica and hola, are Spanish words, not Portuguese), and we are also learning Italian, French, Mandarin, German and Japanese. The funny thing is that is not only the Brazilians that are learning other languages and getting interested about foreign cultures, this alocentrism is common thing all over the world nowadays, but maybe not in U.S. Maybe we are doing such a big thing about all of this, but maybe not, and other languages will start to dominate orkut, the difference is that other cultures might understand each other, while American culture do not. Here in Brazil, we are happy to have friends from other countries; sorry if sometimes we are rude, but what is being rude anyway, is it switching languages or just forget that the Americans don’t want to speak other languages in “their” websites? In this case I think you can call us rude, but for the second reason. We shouldn’t be wasting our time with this discussion. Ok, Americans and Canadians, orkut is yours, but you could read Hernando De Soto´s ideas for a change, discuss poverty, how to fight terrorism and the drug problem, but in English, please…
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Comment by: Giovana at December 6, 2004 01:00 PM
Outra mensagen mal educada ( porque sou filha de Deus)
oi
Lendo reportagens como esta e outras sobre essa invasao a paixao que os brasileiros tem sobre a internet e programas especias como o orkut e fotoblog eh bom porem um pouco preocupante pois esta parecendo que Brasil versus USAians estao na disputa entre o melhor lugar. Por um lado o orkut eh produto americano o que o mundo ja sabe, e por outro lado internet nao possui fronteiras, nem barreiras, temos liberdade de fala, expressao e de escrita, o que para mim eh otimo. descriminacao sao para pessoas ignorantes, e egoista. Integracao para formar comunicacao para pessoas inteligentes. O orkut eh uma prova do que pode acontecer no cotidiano, o que seria ruim pra mim que moro em Nova york, nao interessa quem vc eh ou de onde vens,meu respeio vai ser o mesmo porque foi assim que minha familia me ensinou, eu amo minha origem e devo tudo a ela e dela tenho orgulho, now it doesn't matter if you are black or white we are all the same inside. Brasiliros sao amigavelmente passivo socialmente ativos, we like to have friends. Eu moro nos estados unidos ha mais de dois anos e sei bem dos problemas de integracao social que o americano tem e os resultados que isto pode causar para uma pessoa, nao sou nenhuma ignorante e nem cega para nao ter percebido os problemas que aqui existe , pois assisto televisao, ouco radio, sei do que estou falo e tenho um ouvido afinadissimo, as vezes vejo e escuto coisas que ate Deus duvida.
Anyway eu adoro falar ingles, tenho bastante amigos americanos e nao tenho quase nenhuma reclamacao de ninguem e quase nada daqui . e ainda quero aprender mais e mais sobre culturas.
Internet nada mais eh que uma janela para a comunicacao, uma porta aberta para o aprendizado and anyone can enjoy , why are they making such an issue about it? If you have something against brasilians just tell us don't be embaressed for who you are say the true, you will see that the true is always the best way to go, okay?
beijinhos pra todos na bochecha com gostinho de chocolate
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Comment by: SB at July 19, 2004 01:18 PM