Web2.0 and Bilingualism
August 19th, 2009
Implications of web2.0 for bilingualism on websites – towards best practice
Goblygiadau gwe2.0 ar gyfer gwefannau dwyieithog – tuag at arfer gorau
This has just been released by the Welsh Language Board. It explores issues, good practice and suggestions for organisations which are planning to make web2.0 services available bilingually.
It is an independent report commissioned by the Board from me, with the assistance of Courtenay Honeycutt (Indiana University) and the input of a number of stakeholders.
It is very much intended to be a discussion starter, rather than a definitive statement, so please feel free to join the discussion here…
Researching and writing the report really was very interesting and stimulating indeed, especially the meetings with stakeholders (many thanks to all those who took part).
The report raises a number of different issues which we might like to discuss, but here are just a couple to get us going.
How does an organisation meet the need to be agile and responsive in web2.0 if it needs to outsource its translation?
What should be done with User Generated Content – should it be translated, deleted if in the “wrong” language…?
In the light of comments to my previous posts about the Welsh language blog deficit, is it inevitable that the language which is perceived of as having the largest audience will be more attractive to users generating content and what implications would this have for the other language(s)?
What actually are the most significant concerns for organisations who wish to deliver web2.0 services bilingually?
Feel free to discuss these points, the report, or any other points you feel are relevant.
6 Responses to “Web2.0 and Bilingualism”
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August 19th, 2009 at 05:18 PM I'll be sure to grab a copy and read it on the beach next week! In the meantime, let me just say I'd be quite happy if people at least sorted out their "Web 1.0" bilingualism over here in Ireland, never mind Web 2.0. You wouldn't believe what sometimes passes for "bilingual website" in this country. I'm actually planning to write a righteously indignant blog post about that soon! By the way, nice meeting you in Tartu :-)
August 26th, 2009 at 02:38 AM I like what I've seen, it's a very nuanced contribution (beginning) for the debate. It will take me a few days to fully digest this though! You didn't talk about wikis much, other than to mention Wikipedia and Wicipedia. I'm just wondering if the "stream" concept (absolutely perfect for blogs and the like) is adequate for wikis and possibly other kinds of social media platform. Would publicly-available wikis be within the scope of this report? A hypothetical future example could be an ideas wiki or similar platform for submitting ideas and suggestions to an organisation (maybe WAG or even Bwrdd yr Iaith) and thereby removing the "wall" between staff and public to develop those ideas. I did say it was hypothetical but useful to discuss how something like that would work bilingually. If that's too bold for now, what about private wikis within an organisation? Is there a requirement or recommendation for staff to be able to read - and contribute - in their chosen language and how can this freedom be combined with maximum usefulness for the platform? Sorry, I'm only adding more questions now. Incidentally, on a public sector and social media note, Welsh Assembly are running parallel "streams" on their official Twitter. Yes this is official - I know the member of staff who runs it. http://twitter.com/assemblywales http://twitter.com/CynulliadCymru
August 26th, 2009 at 10:20 AM
Thanks for the comment Michal. I think it is important to note that I don't think we have fully explored the issues around web1.0 yet, particularly if we start thinking about promoting minority language use rather than just making a minority language provision. I also think that the impact of design on language choice and perception needs much more investigation. Hope the weather on the beach is better than here and look forward to catching up with you at another conference soon.
Thanks for your comments too Carl. I absolutely agree that in trying to talk about generic web2.0 issues you tend to lose a lot of the subtle differences between different web2.0 technologies – and these differences are important. I meant for the document to cover wikis, but agree that it is perhaps a more awkward fit than many other web2.0 technologies. The plan for taking this initial work forward includes working with organisations in order to get a deeper and more finessed appreciation of the real world issues and approaches. I suspect that this will naturally throw up issues that are particular to specific technologies as well as issues that are particular to specific organisations, user communities and so on.
I think we are at a very interesting point in time, with a number of organisations producing policies and strategies and actually putting these ideas into practice. As I mention in the report, we are only really going to learn what works and in what circumstances it works by getting out there and doing it.
Incidentally if anyone has access to web2.0 policy documents produced by their organisation and they are permitted to share them with me (on a confidential basis if necessary) I would be very interested in hearing from you.
August 29th, 2009 at 01:07 PM Hi Daniel, So I've read the document, and enjoyed it. Lots of very useful observations and generalizations about Web 2.0 there. In your suggestions, you're arguing for "equality of experience" rather than "equality of opportunity" or "equality of content". If I understand your terminology correctly, this means you don't insist that organizations translate their own blog posts, provided they blog in comparable amounts in both languages. I haven't probably given this as much though as you have but I think I'd prefer a stricter translation policy: always translate your own blog posts but don't insist on translating comments and responses to comments. A bit like the folks at Murmur (murmur.bangor.ac.uk) do: each blog post exists in two versions, Welsh and English, but each such version has its own thread of comments underneath. (I wish their blog engine supported that more elegantly, but that's another story.) Anyway, it's good to see this topic being addressed in Wales. As I said earlier, here in Ireland organizations don't even know how to do bilingual websites properly in Web 1.0 style, never mind Web 2.0.
September 2nd, 2009 at 10:25 AM
Hi Michal, thanks for the comments, I hope it didn’t spoil the beach experience too much!
The distinction I try to make between “messages” and “responses” is important here. What I am suggesting is that “messages” are translated but “responses” are not. This assumes that the distinction can be made, which might be the case in some contexts (e.g. a blog) but not in others (e.g. Twitter). Perhaps the key suggestion here is that not everything an organisation produces needs to be translated. This might have particular significance for those organisations who have to outsource their translation, which has both time and cost implications that could undermine the delivery of web2.0 services.
The other key element is the idea of bridges between the different language streams, which is where the idea of Language Champions fits in (though I am now less convinced by the term itself). Part of the thinking here is that a Language Champion can potentially provide a much more nuanced and context sensitive cross-fertilisation of ideas than a simple total translation and cross posting of everything. There are obviously resource implications here too – but it would be interesting to see how they compare with total translation in practice.
If such bridges are not provided then bilingual users need to decide which language to post their comments in, or to post twice, the most widely used language may generate a richer discussion (it may anyway), non X-speakers may be suspicious about what the X-speakers are talking about and so on.
I suspect that a lot of this may actually be quite context dependent and that different solutions will be appropriate in different contexts. We need a more refined understanding of the significant contextual factors and their influence.
September 3rd, 2009 at 04:07 PM If by "messages" you mean things like blog posts and by "responses" you mean things like comments underneath those blog posts, then we are in agreement and I had simply misunderstood. Must have been the sun. Yes, that is a sensible recommendation. In particular, I agree that it would be foolish to expect user-generated content (responses) to be translated, regardless of who by, because that would open a whole new can of worms.