Friday, June 22, 2007

Localization in the Globalized World

On June 19, 2007, YouTube founders Chad Hurley and Steve Chen announced the launch of nine new versions of the site in Brazil, France, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Ireland and UK.

Each of these new sites is fully translated and localized for each country including content, interface, search, user report as well as such community features as video ratings, sharing, and content flagging. More importantly, the new sites will have localized advertisements.

According to Google CEO Eric Schmidt, the company is finding the right business model to make YouTube profitable, and the localized ads are one of their strategies. Google acquired YouTube in 2006.

This makes sense. If you are a resident of Japan, you are likely to be more interested in services of DoCoMo rather than those of AT&T and Verizon.

In this globalized world, localization remains important…

HSBC bills itself The world's local bank. McDonald's offers Veg Menu in India. These are just a few examples of localization.


3 comments:

  1. I agree. To keep up with the footsteps of people, localization is important.

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  2. Hi day-dreamer/happysurfer,
    Thanks for your comments.

    Perhaps I should point out that McDonald's India must still maintain its American flavor. Too much localization means its menu will look too similar to traditional Indian food. So there is a balance game to play...

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