Trials and Tribulations of Global Communities
I’m not about to write a lengthy essay on online cultures. Just an interesting observation on some events on the Tornado mailing list.
So, I lurk in that mailing list because Tornado is one of those awesome technologies in the Python world, and there are usually gems flying around.
As with most discussion groups I join, English is the norm. In fact, some have gone as far as to argue that English should be the lingua franca of hackers. To a great extent, I agree.
So, all is well until one day some Chinese messages started appearing on the list. Now, I read and write Chinese but I can’t making a living with Chinese geek-speak. Those messages didn’t bother me though I was thinking it must be annoying to non-Chinese speaking subscribers. And true enough, we got a message from one of the subscribers today:
我们看不懂你的中文信息，写英语，请。
Obviously the output of machine translation with an input to the effect of:
We cannot understand your Chinese messages, write in English, please.
I find it pretty amusing, and hope our fellow Chinese hackers don’t take offense.
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