I was recently interviewed by the lovely people over at Sajan, who offer “a full range of language translation and localization services, covering all languages from Afrikaans to Welsh.” How awesome is that!? Here’s a short intro, you can check out Part 1 of the interview at the source over at Sajan.com.
You work extensively with software companies. What challenges do many software vendors seem to run into when attempting to adapt their products in new international markets?
Of course, vendors need to deal with multiple languages when selling to foreign markets, but there are cultural issues too. For example, in Japan, technology-based security controls are often secondary to human trust relationships; in some Mediterranean cultures a “thumbs up” or “okay” icon may be considered offensive.In many non-U.S. markets, products must also handle inferior infrastructures, variable technology adoption or even availability of clean power—and not just in developing nations. For example, in Australia, technology adoption is high, but consumer bandwidth is limited and/or expensive.
via Expert interview on software localization for worldwide markets: Part 1 | Sajan.