Will the Internet of the Future Be in Chinese?

[anon45]

Lol its a blog.

 

[scuthan]

Yes, but IIRC, there is no such thing as a "Chinese" language. Its either Mandarin or Cantonese, right?

No, there are 7-10 different dialects in china by different definitions. Mandarin has largest native speaking population, Cantonese is third, they are all Chinese dialects. All chinese dialects are developed from middle Chinese 1000 years ago except Hokkien which descends from old Chinese.

there is only one standard form of colloquial chinese, which was created 100 years ago. in China is called "Putonghua" (lterally "common speech"), in Taiwan it is called "Guoyu" (lterally "National Language"). Our standard chinese is basically a simplified version of Beijing dialect, so western people use the old-fashioned name "Mandarin" to name it. it is not mandarin actually...

when it comes to written form, there are only simplified chinese and tradtional chinese. there is no such as "written mandarin" ot "written cantonese".A person from Taipei might only know how to speak mandarin, and most hongkong people can only speak cantonese. but they can understand 100% of each other's newspaper and book. "Modern chinese literature" is the norm of standard chinese by china's language laws. when speak dialects, we basically follow it as well.

If you pay attention to websites and softwares with multi-language support (such as google), there are two options: simplified and tradtioanl.

so when speak of "chinese", it refers to standard chinese, aka what you called "mandarin". ir is a very complicate and confusing story.

 

[Ganges Zephyr]

English by far would always be the Internet present and future. It's a simple and widely spoken language and even the chinese (also all south eastern nations) are learning english to be more competitive

 

[Fasih Khan]

Alot of Learning ... Get back to School

 

[jagjitnatt]

The analysis is wrong. It circles around the number of internet users. As India grows, a lot of new people will gain access to the internet, and these people will be Hindi speaking, with a little understanding of English.
This was a whole lot of new english speakers will join the internet community, and the instead rise of chinese in the future, we will see more english growth.

The chinese growth right now is due to large number of chinese people who gained access to internet in the past 2 decades, but is will reach a saturation stage soon, but Indians are a little behind and are yet to saturate in 2040 or so, and they will all be English speaking people.

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

Yes, but IIRC, there is no such thing as a "Chinese" language. Its either Mandarin or Cantonese, right?

Not quite true, there is such a thing as the "Chinese language" (Han yu).

Mandarin/Cantonese/Shanghainese are all just "dialects" of the Chinese language, and the written form is the same for all.

The difference between a language and a dialect... is a political issue, as described by this principle:

A language is a dialect with an army and navy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

There is a certain level of debate about this however, and I suppose it just depends on what definition you use.

 

[somebozo]

No it wont be..such reports are made by employment desperate writers seeking a stir..internet will at large remain in its native language "English".

 

[scuthan]

You should feel lucky that the day chinese replaces English, if there is one which i leave to doubt, will not possibly come in our life time.

Chinese is very difficult to learn especially for those whose native language is not japanese, korean, and vietnamnese. Personally i think chinese is a very beautiful language, logic and refined grammar and vocabulary, rich classic literature. many idioms in daily use date back to confucious and other thinkers' classics 2000 years ago. English, it is too shallow, I presume.

 

[greatsequence]

English Dominance will definitely be challenged. Internet is already moving away from it. As we speak you can get domain names in non latin.

Unless the education system is changed in India and pakistan we will not be able to get rid of English.
Google Transliterate API - Google Code

 

[Fireurimagination]

Nopes English is going nowhere, Chinese is not spoken any where else except China where as English is spoken and understood on 2/3rd of the planet

There is a high number of Chinese internet users and these are only the one who surf the net in Chinese none other. In fact I read somewhere that China is moving big time towards English. For Chinese/Mandarin to dominate internet China will have to colonize half the planet for 200+ years

 

[Developereo]

What matters is not the number of users but the number of websites. Most websites try to address two audiences: the local and the global. Since English is spoken by people in many countries, a website in English can serve the dual purpose.

This is not the case with Chinese since it is spoken in very few countries, and it is unlikely that people will maintain a separate website just for the Chinese-speaking audience.

 

[tallboy123]

Guys i would like to say in future,every country will use its own language on internet..
Like chinese will use chinese on net..
Muslim countries will use urdu..
In India we may use 50 languages but Hindi will be most of it..
And English will be used by US Uk and canadians..

People love to their language very much..

In today's world people love to browse the web in their own language..
It help a person who doesn't know english and can easily use internet..

use of english by People of india,arab countries,chinese and japanese will be history..
People will make their own OS with their own language..
For Example:
In india we have BOSS operating system which supports every major languages of india..

That's the future of Internet..

 

[hardcoreman]

Will the Internet of the Future Be in Chinese?

Published December 28, 2010, FoxNews.com

English is the most widely used language on the Internet, but it could be less than five years before Chinese becomes the dominant language, one site argues.

English is the international language of business and commerce -- but its era of dominance on the Internet could be coming to an end.

An infographic circulating on the Internet highlights the growing prominence of Chinese users on the web, and suggest that Chinese may be the dominant language on the world wide web within five years.

The ascension of the Chinese language is no surprise given China's population. According to tech enthusiast blog the Next Web, which created the chart, China gained an additional 36 million Internet users last year taking the country to a total of 440 million users over all. Comparatively, there are 536 million English speaking users online it argues, citing figures from Internet World Stats.

Contributing editor Greg Sterling of Search Engine Land doesn't see such a straightforward coup by the Chinese language, however.

"Chinese will never replace English as the 'official' language of the Internet," Sterling told FoxNews.com. "This is clearly based on raw numbers and the size of China's Internet population," he said, noting that sheer users won't be enough to usurp the cultural significance of English.

"That's because the world speaks English while few other than Chinese nationals speak Chinese," Sterling said.

The Next Web chart emphasizes China's relatively low worldwide penetration -- meaning China's growth potential remains high for some time. If these growth rates stay consistent, the Next Web believes Chinese could become the dominant language on the Internet in less than five years.

Sterling argues that despite these potentials, one key factor will prevent Chinese from really taking hold online: censorship. "The censored and still-closed nature of the Chinese Internet further argues against Chinese taking over the virtual world," he told FoxNews.com.

David Graddol, a British applied linguist and broadcaster, has been researching issues relating to global English for over a decade. In English Next (2006), a recent report on the future of the language, Graddol acknowledged a key trend, that "Asia, especially India and China probably now holds the key to the long-term future of English as a global language."

"In terms of native-speaker rankings, English is falling in the world league tables," Graddol warned. "English has slipped to fourth place, where its position will become challenged by Arabic in the middle of the present century."

By then, Sterling admits to the possibility that the Internet landscape could be founded on another language.

"In 50 years that may be different and everyone may be talking Chinese (Mandarin) as a second language -- as the world does with English now."


Read more: FoxNews.com - Will the Internet of the Future Be in Chinese?

not possible because china is enemy of internet..............

 

[below_freezing]

What matters is not the number of users but the number of websites. Most websites try to address two audiences: the local and the global. Since English is spoken by people in many countries, a website in English can serve the dual purpose.

This is not the case with Chinese since it is spoken in very few countries, and it is unlikely that people will maintain a separate website just for the Chinese-speaking audience.

In number of websites we're going far up as well. Chinese is spoken throughout much of southeast asia.