SFGHQ Forum Admin: “We speak English”
Tristan Oliver, Founder | September 22, 2008
Slingerland’s Controversial Comments Over Dual-Language Post
Sonic fans exist all over the world. While many of them are in English-speaking regions, some hail from more exotic or remote locations where a different language is primarily spoken. Even in the United States, the melting pot nature of society yields English to only be used as a second language. Many of these fans visit Sonic and gaming sites, including this one, using a translator to get by. A few participate in the discussion by writing in the language that is most familiar.
However, if you do that on the Sonic Fan Games HQ forum, one of its moderators will evidently tell you to stop, and speak English.
“We speak English at this forum. English,” warned Slingerland in a thread that’s been growing since yesterday afternoon. The stern response came as a reaction to a Portuguese Sonic fan promoting a beta of his Sonic fan game Sonic: The Last Ring. Junior Member DragonSky00 posted details and responses to the beta in both Portuguese and English via a translator.
But the duality wasn’t enough to satisfy the moderator, who is also director of the Sonic Nexus fan game project.
When an English-speaking member spoke out, believing SFGHQ should have non-English speaking moderators, Slingerland slung back:
How about you just stop talking? We are an English forum.
I speak French fluently, by the way, so that just shits on anything smart that you had to suggest.
The debate mirrors several larger English only issues that have hit the news in recent years. From schools to stores, big and small, several complaints have been brought about of discriminatory behavior surrounding the use of other languages. Some cities in the United States have brought up English only proposals, mainly as they relate to how children are taught. Nashville, Tennessee is one major American city that has considered English-only proposal for its citizens to vote on.
In the case of Sonic Fan Games HQ, however, administrators are backing Slingerland’s strong language.
“I agree with Slingerland. This is a predominantly English speaking forum, we have very few members who speak Portuguese,” said Rael0505, the forum administrator. “Just don’t do it.”
Forum member DimensionWarped noted:
No, we don’t have any rule against people who are unskilled in English. As long as he can communicate without much issue, it’s fine.
As for the two languages thing, it’s really only annoying if they speak alternatively in one language or another in a way that most people can’t understand parts of it. As long as a direct translation is available, it’s fine.
There’s one problem though–DW’s words aren’t true.
A quick glance at the SFGHQ forum rules reveals that the site indeed does have an English-only policy, in effect since late 2006:
Okay since it has been a problem lately it is time to make this clear: this is an English speaking forum. As such you should be expected to know English, if you do not have a proper grasp of the English language then this place is not for you. Sorry, don’t mean to discriminate based on this, but it has been a problem lately with a member making 20 odd something posts that nobody can understand, followed by said member making 20 more posts asking why no one can understand said person.
So, what do you think? Is the policy discriminatory against an increasing number of Sonic fans hailing from Brazil, Portugal, Mexico, and other non-English speaking regions? Given the language duality, were the comments even justified? Should a predominantly English-centric Sonic community be more tolerant of ESL individuals, and those who can’t speak English at all? Or should those fans buck up and use a translator or simply learn English? Sound off in the comment box below.
Filed Under Fan Flash, Sonic Fan Flash, Sonic Scene
This issue is so trivial, it’s insane. SFGHQ speaks English. Members who don’t predominately speak English do to the point to where we can understand him. Cstyler, a Russian member, speaks broken English, but we can understand him. All I wanted was for BlueSky00 was to stop posting his Portuguese translations. There are Sonic fan sites for just about every language. We happen to be English.
You guys must have nothing else to talk about. Tristan, take your sensationalist FOX News bullshit somewhere else. Get it out of our communities. I used to be a fan of this site, but over the recent months, I’ve grown to dislike the hell out of it.
The problem with your community news reporting is that you are not involved in these communities. You look at it through a glass window and consistently report wrong on it. Have you noticed people calling you out lately on things? Yeah, that’s because you’ve been wrong. You worry about being “FIRST” with your big, red banner of attention rather than correct.
In short, you are a huge douchebag.
This isn’t a very un-biased news site anymore… Every headline has one side in favor of another… and everything is always so fluffed up.
SFGHQ - English Only? - If you’ve read the rules yourself - and know that YES they are…why make it into such a big deal?
And by the way - Your stories hold no weight in my mind because you don’t do all your research!
-> Just how many individuals ARE there that speak a language other than English… If its just a handful, and the majority of that handful are getting by with “broken english” than all your reporting on is “0.01%”
Huepow00–it’s a little more than .01%.
At least looking at the statistics on this site in the past month, over 17.6% of our audience has been from non-English speaking nations.
That’s nothing to sneeze at…and that’s why this story is important.
Heck, there were a couple SAGE entries this year that were from Sonic fans that spoke another language–and made it known on their booth pages. As the Internet grows around the world, not everyone’s going to know English. The question is, will those who *do* know the language be welcoming to their ideas and discussion, even if understanding them may require a translator?
For reference, I checked with several other major Sonic community boards that are predominantly English, and X-Cult is the only other one with an outright “English only” policy. (Others, such as the Sonic Stadium and Sonic Retro, do not outright ban other languages, and in fact offer some leniency to those who don’t know it. See? I do my research. =P )
There is something troubling and therefore newsworthy, whether you believe bias exists or not, when an administrator of a major Sonic community message board, touting himself as “America’s Admin” on that board, bluntly chooses to enforce an “English only” policy on a new member that may not know better. This is the stuff that has occasionally been brought up in courts in the US and through private internal affairs with some companies on a basis of discrimination. Reaffirming the policy in that same tone when another member suggests that maybe there should be a non-English speaking admin doesn’t make the situation any better.
Given the global outreach the Sonic franchise has had over the years, ask yourself–is this really smart?
-T
Why is this a news story? It shouldn’t be.
It isn’t a matter of discrimination, but simply a matter of communication. If you can’t communicate with the members of the board, then there really isn’t much in being on the board. If however, you can bypass those issues, we don’t have a problem.
By the way, it isn’t a rule so much as a guideline. It isn’t a punishable offense and we’ve never issued infractions or bans for speaking in another language. The only action we would take to posts in another language is translation or in extreme cases, closing topics made in said language.
Fact is, while we may have viewers who are from other countries, they aren’t consolidated to any particular country. We have a number of Spanish speakers and a very tiny number of Portugese speakers, a smattering of Russian uspeakers, and a few French speakers, but having a discussion in one of those languages on our forum is pointless because it would basically consist of a chat between two individuals, something more efficiently kept to an instant message conversation.
For the sake of communication, we prefer to keep discussions in one language.
As for whether this is news? Heh. What is it with you, do you just troll around random forums hoping to find some mole hill you can build mountains from?
But DW–you obviously saw your words in the story against the policy, and you must have seen that I clearly noted DragonSky00 wrote his comments both in Portuguese and in English. That tells me that he may have been within the guidelines of your policy–but Slingerland still went off simply because the Portuguese was still there. Why did that happen, if that’s the case? Where was the problem?
That, pared with the increasing “English only” mentality that many Americans took in this decade to the point where we’re now seeing a microcosm of it at a Sonic board of all places–is why it’s a news story.
A newsperson shouldn’t make editorial suggestions, but I would maybe advise to revise your policy more in the line of Retro or the Green Hill Zone forums. The policy, as it is, does come off so blatant it could border a discriminatory feeling for some, and perhaps scare those folks off. (Heck, the word “discriminate” is even *used* in the policy, and though the intention may not be there, that won’t stop many from believing it is.)
As to “trolling”–that’s how the Sonic and the Black Knight news broke. It can’t be that bad. And when it comes to community news, in some cases looking at the boards is the only way to break news.
This community–the good, bad, and ugly of it, will continue to be covered by this site. I personally pride myself on this type of coverage because it’s not the “Hey, this SFG is out and it’s incredible!” rose bushels that seem to be expected of everyone here. It happened with some of our SAGE reviews and I wholly supported it. The not so great news should be covered with the great news coming out of Sonic fan communities.
And to think this isn’t the worst fan story I’ve covered…
-T
Slingerland didn’t go off on him for posting in Portugese. He got a little miffed when he saw the statement that we should have Portugese moderators (impossible mainly due to the lack of Portugese-speaking members at the board)… which I’ll say right now was probably a result of mistranslation. But that much is irrelevant, because what we are talking about here is simply the policy.
Speaking of, Slingerland does not speak for the site or its rules. His only role in the community is to organize events and enforce policy. Otherwise his words speak for the site the same as any other member.
As for whether people interpret our forum’s language policy as discriminatory, I’d have to say that will only be the case if you continue to represent it as some kind of horrendous audacity when in reality it is basically harmless and unimportant to our site or the things we do there.
Don’t turn this into some kind of social issue. It isn’t one. No amount of likening it to certain sects of certain countries will change that you are trying to make news out of non-news.
I would make the argument that it is an issue–maybe not a social issue to some, but an issue at the least–because members of the forum were talking about it.
If the story stopped dead at Slingerland’s first warning, I could see eye to eye with many of you claiming that this isn’t news. But it didn’t, and there were two responses to the English-only issue, which prompted Slingerland’s second response.
That means to someone, somewhere–this is an issue.
-T
And I’ll say right now who that someone is and what that issue is. It’s your issue and the issue is that it’s a slow news period.
Why is Tristan trying to string an event on a fan forum with American Current Affairs? Journalistically, it makes no sense.
Mate, I can see why you want to cover the bad as well as the good…. but the last thing the community needs is more drama, especially when you take what is otherwise a pretty mediocre affair (an English-speaking forum would like its members to communicate with each other properly? Stop the presses :P) into an episode of Panorama.
With a fan community - an environment that thrives on people getting along and sharing information and just generally being cool - there’s no incentive in digging up dirt on anyone, particularly if what’s happened here amounts to an admin sneezing. There is a distinction between events that happen on an online fan space and real life political events, and it’s worth understanding what that distinction is.
Holy shit, you are hilarious, Tristan.
This story is not an issue. None of the other foreign members I’ve talked to have had no problem with those posts until you made it a problem, especially since we’ve been an English forum since the beginning (1998). Communities make their own drama as is, so we don’t need your uninvolved self stirring the pot. If you’re going to report on communities, you might as well be apart of them and participate. You have never taken in the context and the environment in which your “news” takes place. Now, we are here - calling you out once more.
If you’re so dead set on representing non-English Sonic fans, take your own advice and make TSSZ in 20 different languages. Do it. I dare you. Selecting one language (the majority) for the forum, as DW put it, is for the sake of communication as a whole. You think that it’s discriminatory to make a forum entirely English, but check this shit out: what if I want to post in a thread, but I can’t due to the fact that I do not speak say…Spanish? I’m the odd man out.
If you’re going to go on and on about this subject, go call out the other English communities and bitch at them. Seriously, go over to Svend and tell his forum to be less “English.” You’ll get a cold shoulder there, too. Tweaker runs Sonic Retro and he has posted above that this story is worthless. Looks like he is of the same school as the rest of us.
Like I said in the Shadow review thread yesterday…”must be a slow news day at the ol’ TSSZ.” Let the news come to you. Don’t go out and MAKE news. Who are you? The Sonic community tabloids?
Finally, this story is none other than a thinly disguised personal vendetta. Yes, admit it, Tristan. You don’t like me. Quite frankly, I don’t blame you, because I’ve been harping on your sensationalist ass for months now for not liking any story that you write (and this article further reinforces this sentiment). However, if you want to come off as a “professional” news site, you certainly are failing at that now, too. It’s completely sad that you have relegated yourself to this level.
Go back to J-school.
Wow. This is pathetic. Who gives a fuck what laguage people speak? That’s like saying there’s a new kid in school, he speaks Japanesse, it’s America, he’s trying to learn English, but, struggling, no one can undersand him, the school kicks him out. Hell no. That can’t work. People can sue for discrimintory stuff like that. While I support the whole “If you live in America, learn how to speak English thing”, this is the internet. The whole world. Here’s a fucking brainiac idea, have fucking translatrs on the dammed site! ZOMG. BEST. IDEA. SINCE. TV. PERIOD.
Anyways, I forget which, but, I’m pretty sure it’s Obama, not McCain, one of the two wants American kids to learn Spanish, Italian, and one other in Elementary school. I’m against that. If you live in America, learn the language we speak, why should we have to learn your language, cause you moved here, and refuse to switch languages?
Talk about starting up drama Tristan. We need some real news to talk about around here…
Actually, let me make this statement right now:
I, Tweaker, an official respresentative of Sonic Retro, hearby state that anyone who does not speak English or speaks bad English will NOT be allowed to post on the Sonic Retro forums.
Are you going to make a news story about that? I hope you do, because that’s something I WANT people to know. English, motherfucker, do you speak it?!
Tweaker you said it well. I don’t know about you but most of the forums I visit only use one language. Who the hell has ever heard of a bilingual forum before anyway? I would just take this “news” down Tristan before it gets out of hand. Not to mention you totally threw Slingerland under the bus for no reason at all. If I were you I’d think real hard before “reporting” on something like this again.
Whilst the argument is focused on Tristan and Slingerland… (Don’t give me crap for this. This is merely an idea, and it can be achieved, but it’d require hours of programming, coding, etc. But right now, consider it “Sci-Fi”)
Here I propose a new idea: built-in forum-translators. This will reduce the need for external translators (Babelfish, Google, etc.). A simple add-on for any forum regardless of platform, that will allow messages to be translated to the language of the client user. For example, if you speak Portugese, and you visit an English forum, all English posts will be translated to Portugese, making it easy for the user to understand. It will also work Vice-versa, so any posts in foreign languages will be translated to English. Codename-”Babelview.”
Perhaps if such a translation utility for forums could be achieved, we could hear less of Slingerland and Tristan argue over an error in communication.
Example: Let’s use Portuguese as an example. Why don’t we use a simple statement, shall we? Something like “Sonic Rocks”
Original Post in English:
“Sonic Rocks.”
Posted by: ExampleUser123
And the same post as it would appear on a Portuguese computer viewing the same forum:
“Rochas De Sonic!”
Afixado perto: ExampleUser123
…yeah, sorry Tristan, but I don’t think this is an issue, either. At the same time, I think Slingerland really needs to ease off a bit.
Nah, I’m good.
Tristan…. bad choice of story material brah.
And Blaze, I dunno man, I think Brad did nothing wrong at all
Wow Tristan, half of this is flat out false. I’ve never even heard of you, and you clearly haven’t been part of our community in the past few years or you would know that we have nothing against non-native speakers. Blue Frenzy, Cyber Rat 101, SefirothDB, and Damizean are all non-native speakers, but have a good enough hold on our language to communicate with us and are very valued members. Communication is the problem entirely with foreign speakers - we can’t allow a dozen different languages to be spoken on our forum for obvious reasons.
I would also like to add that we’re fine with Bluesky00 using a translator. All we asked was that he remove the Portuguese text above each translation because it was unnecessary and cluttered up his posts. Learn to read.
Don’t you have anything better to do, Tristan, than try to find things to complain about a forum you don’t even go to? You’re just trying to start trouble.
-Rael (SFGHQ administrator/site maintainer)
Honestly?
I think everybody needs to chill out.
Tristan, sorry, but I don’t think this is worthy of a news story either. When I first read the headline and then article, to me it just seems like digging up dirt on Slingerland. “Controversial” comments? To me, it really does just seem like him enforcing the rules - that’s his job as a moderator - and putting his own personal opinion on things,
But if Tristan was wrong, and this really isn’t an issue, then everybody else is sure as hell making it one. As Svend said, in the end, this is a fan community which thrives simply on people getting along with each other. So Tristan posts a news article, and makes a mistake in doing so. We’re not exactly rectifying the mistake by having a heated argument. The mistake here as far as I can see is making drama where there really shouldn’t be any, and we’re making that same mistake in our reactions. A simple “Hey, this isn’t really news, you’re kinda making a mountain out of a molehill here” would suffice instead of bringing personal vendettas and insults into the mix.
Personally, I love the coverage that TSSZ provides. Slingerland has mentioned that there is a lack of in-community perspective - to be really honest, I don’t expect there to be. Sure, people here probably have degrees in journalism but in the end this isn’t The New York Times. We’re only human, and more than I expect there to be “perfect” perspective I expect there to be mistakes. So because we all make mistakes, and nobody really can write the perfect news story, I prefer to go to at least four different sites with Sonic news and make my own perspective based on facts from many different points of view. I don’t see the problem here.
At the very end of the day this site is Tristan’s and technically he should be able to do what he wants with it, whether we like what he’s doing or not. We don’t HAVE to come here to get news.
Calm down. He made a mistake, guys, and as we should all know as Sonic fans, you live and learn.
It’s funny that you guys all harp on Tristan for being “unprofessional.” Didn’t you guys at Sonic Stadium just go through hell and high water to make the point that journalistic professionalism doesn’t matter in the Sonic community?
Slingerland, you create plenty of drama yourself, and you do it on purpose at that. Just because you do it while acting badass doesn’t mean you’re not still doing it. You can do what you want, but it’s a bit hypocritical to go harping on Tristan for the drama thing.
“The problem with your community news reporting is that you are not involved in these communities. You look at it through a glass window”
Wouldn’t that be… a good thing?
When you throw in those little anti-TSSZ remarks in your Sonic Stadium articles, it only makes you look, dare I say it… threatened. Just chill, dude.
Don’t compare Slingerland to Tristan. I’ve never seen Slingerland provide false information for the sole purpose of pissing off another community. No, it’s not a good thing. Tristan has never been part of our community yet he makes a “news” article calling us a bunch of racist bastards. He doesn’t even understand how our community works, hence the false information. How can we not feel threatened?
You’re a liar, Tristan. This article should not exist. This doesn’t even constitute as news.
“Calm down. He made a mistake, guys, and as we should all know as Sonic fans, you live and learn.”
Live and learn? Please excuse me while I go vomit. This is more than a simple mistake - even if this were true (which it is NOT, hence why this article needs to be removed), it’s evident that the only purpose of this article is to start up drama between communities. One with such a mentality should not be writing news articles. Not to mention that he has never even been part of our community and shouldn’t open his mouth to begin with, as he CAN’T possibly understand what’s going on.
Uh, Rael, Tristan has been part of SFGHQ far longer than you have.
A lotttt longer.
I suggest you just take a step back and calm down. He may not be as active as he used to be, but he was around before any of the past incarnations we’ve gone thru over the past 7ish years. Take my word for it.
Regardless, still think the article was a little off base.
SFGHQ has changed a lot since he was active, then. Hell, since I joined, SFGHQ has gone through four different message boards. He’s too out of the loop to be writing news articles about us.
Rael, yeah, I agree with you. This article IS just starting up drama between communities. But aren’t we all doing exactly the same thing by turning this into a huge argument, bordering on flame war? I think we’ve all put our two cents in and told Tristan how we feel. There’s nothing more to it. So why do we need to continue arguing and insulting others over this? We don’t need all this drama, can’t somebody be the bigger man and say “Okay, I’m sorry, let’s quit fighting”? I know people have been hurt here, but this is getting stupid now.
This article makes SFGHQ look like a bunch of racist scumbags. If it’s starting drama, it should be taken down. We all seem to agree that it’s untrue (except for Tristan, anyway).
Hahaha wow. Way to go making yourself look like a huge douche bag. Stirring drama in a community is SERIOUSLY not a way to go.
’sup FOX news:
Appreciate the early April Fools joke.
Love,
Wesker
For crying out loud Tristan, why the hell did you waste your time writing this?This is not a issue at all.
Does anyone realize how hypocritical this is? SFGHQ can admit we don’t have any tools to assist Non-English speakers and that SFGHQ does require content to be in English. But so does TSSZ I do not see any translator on your page. Why don’t you print your articles in other languages? How can you get so high and mighty so as to judge others and fill a 600 word article with tabloid style crap. Sure the situation is a bit different but the concept is the same and what must have been your personal attempt behind it.
Internet - Serious Business.
–Tristan ” …over 17.6% (of TssZ viewers) are from non-English speaking ‘areas’…”
-> Yea… and how many of them know how to speak English?… are you telling me you thought a tabloid article to showcase your continued, subtle, dislike of Slingerland … aimed at 17.6% of your viewer base was a Top Headline?
[...] coverage of a Sonic Fan Games HQ administrator’s blunt enforcement of an “English Only” [...]
@PorpoiseMuffins:
Hey man, nice to see you on here. Just thought I’d clarify some things up though - I agree, the drama that’s unfolding here isn’t any good, but I can understand why some people would get a bit riled…
——
“It’s funny that you guys all harp on Tristan for being “unprofessional.” Didn’t you guys at Sonic Stadium just go through hell and high water to make the point that journalistic professionalism doesn’t matter in the Sonic community?”
Well yeah I did (Slingerland had nothing to do with that debate). To defend myself a little bit, I don’t mind if a Sonic fansite decides to become the ‘BBC’ of the fan community. I wasn’t against the idea - Sonic News took that ’serious’ stance for a long time, before I realised that once you make that choice, you have to take on board serious journalistic responsibilities that are just not worth adhering to in the Sonic online community.
Now Tristan has made that for TSSZ to become that ’serious’ outlet for Sonic news, it has to take on all of those journalistic responsibilities. With that in mind, read this article again. There’s a heavy bias against Slingerland (using terms such as ‘controversial’ and ’strong language’ and ’slung back’) - anyone writing this subjectively would have simply left out the whole Slingerland business, but where’s the headline in that?
TSSZ has (quite strongly, considering its wording) accused Slingerland of being ‘controversial’, when clearly Tristan is about the only person who believes so. That shows a level of editorial bias, regardless of what Slingerland has said about TSSZ in the past or how much he appears to have annoyed Tristan.
That alone justifies people’s concerns with the article - the moment you put about (and argue in your comments box) professional journalistic practices, people are going to pull you up if you make a mistake. I’ve been there and felt that, and now Tristan is feeling it too.
TSSZ has looked at this incident from an ‘outsider-looking-in’ perspective and, while it can be good journalistic practice to do that in order to distance yourself and not become influenced or biased, you also lose a hell of a lot of context.
The story is too missing context, and has treated a relatively trivial matter on the same level as discrimination in American schools. I don’t think those two are in any way, shape or form linked, and it just looks like the writer is drawing tenuous conclusions.
——
“When you throw in those little anti-TSSZ remarks in your Sonic Stadium articles, it only makes you look, dare I say it… threatened. Just chill, dude.”
I would hardly call them anti-TSSZ. The Sonic Stadium is a carefree, happy-go-lucky fansite that doesn’t take fellow fansites (or itself, most importantly) very seriously.
Slingerland and I know many fellow webmasters (Retro, SFGHQ, CulT, Wrecks) and we often poke at them in our articles, TSSZ isn’t the only one. They poke at us right back. We link to them, they link to us (which I see TSSZ hasn’t done regarding our break of Sonic Ultimate Genesis Collection). But it’s hardly out of spite or threatened nature. It’s just a laugh, and our friends know this. I guess TSSZ takes things a bit more seriously, so I will consider this in future.
Good grief, I’m the one who made the original policy. It makes perfect sense. Blue Frenzy has adapted for years, although his English is becoming a little more broken lately. IT MUST BE A CONSPIRACY! QUICK MAKE A NEWS STORY ABOUT IT!
@Svend:
Thanks for the clarification on your stance. I understand where you’re coming from, although one might still argue that Tristan never really claimed TSSZ was a super serious news source to begin with (I don’t really know, maybe I’m wrong on that). Sure, he’s got flashy graphics and “breaking news” banners, but if I’m not mistaken, Tristan’s real job is actually creating such graphics for news broadcasts. The way I see it, it’s all in fun. I mean, Sonic isn’t really serious business, but it can be fun to pretend it is
I agree that the article really isn’t newsworthy. Still, I actually enjoy “fan news” like this (trivial as it may be at times) and wouldn’t mind seeing more of it. The reason this particular article seems awkward–and maybe even a bit suspicious–is that it is so selective and seemingly random. If Tristan started reporting on the updates and drama on SMS (not that we have a lot) and every other semi-large Sonic site it might make more sense, but obviously that would be a monumental task.
As for the jabs at other sites on Sonic Stadium, I definitely understand that they can be lighthearted and fun, it just that some of the ones aimed at TSSZ seemed to reek of resentment and some sort of personal grudge. Slingerland’s response in the above comments seems to confirm my suspicion.
All and all, I like and agree with your new philosophy on the community, Svend. The only thing that I would argue is that drama is unavoidable and necessary to some degree in any group setting. I think that when it arises it needs to be dealt with, and I don’t think that ignoring it, making fun of it, or suppressing it helps–It only leads to more drama and resentment. I’m not accusing you or anything, I just think that it’s something everyone in our little corner of the Internet should be aware of.
Well I was going to post some nasty tidbits but it seems most of the comments cover what I wanted to say… and much more politely.
As you probably didn’t know, Tristan, *I’M* the owner and Admin of SFGHQ. I know you are likely ignorant of that fact since you made no attempt to contact me regarding the matter. Please make some effort to do so if you plan to slander my site and its users again.
Hugs and kisses;
=Smidge=
You know what pisses me off? How idiots like you get offended over little shit like this, and have go to city hall over it.
You completely missed the point of “We’re an English speaking forum”. it’s matter of communication, NOT discrimination, as what DW said. If some guy who only spoke in a completely different language comes to English dominant forum, would you understand what he was saying? And vice versa, what if an “English speaker” went to a Portuguese or Russian speaking forum, would they be able to understand us? Has not a damn thing to do with race.
I don’t care how long this guy has been on SFGHQ, he obviously has no fucking clue what’s going on.
Now now TRD. After thinking about it, this article actually IS a perfect example of modern journalism!
See, modern journalism is no longer about “facts” (finger quotes!) but about controversy. Truth is boring and pedestrian, but Truthiness gets people’s attention and, more importantly, ratings.
He even said it himself yesterday: “our story was the second most read story of the day yesterday and, at present, is our most read story today. ” How much money do you think he made in ad revenue? What do you think that did for his search engine ranking with all the new links to this article?
With something like this on his resume he could get his own show on Fox!
=Smidge=
[...] story we carried regarding a member policy of the Sonic Fan Games HQ to only speak English that caused so much [...]
I do not think prohibiting other languages on forums would be too discriminatory - it has more to do with a matter of preference for the majority of its users.
On internet forums, most posts are kept in one language for the main reason that having to create two copies of the same paragraph takes up space - something that people don’t want to excessively scroll through. It would be very bothersome if the huge majority of users have to scroll through a translation that has no meaning to them. It would be even worse if every post came with six other translations - nothing users want to deal with. It’s a matter of convenience really.
The real world and the internet has came up with its own set of solutions.
In the real world, one solution for people who have trouble with other languages is to of course learn English (or some other main language). The other is through a translation aide. Of course, you can always say the same sentence in both languages (as with many Canadian political speeches) at the expense of some convenience to the audience. There’s nothing too wrong with that when it’s commonly accepted.
For the televised debates however, they were held in two separate languages - French and English. Why? Because televised debates both have the aim to gather many views and squeeze as much content within the allotted time, and in order to do that, favour the consumer. For the French debate, all those who could understand French watched it with ease. Those who didn’t relied on having the French translated into English. So two separate versions of the same debate were offered.
The Internet has came up with their own solutions as well. As well as free translation services of questionable quality, users who speak a common language will gather in a forum that uses that common language. Sonic fans who speak English will gather in English forums, fans who speak French will gather in ‘mirror’ French forums, and etc.
For the case of Portuguese-speaking members, it would make sense for them to gather in a Portuguese-speaking forum. If DragonSky00 wanted to promote his beta in two languages, it would make sense for him to make two posts - one in English in an English forum, the other in Portuguese in a Portuguese forum (granted there is one). This would save unnecessary anger to users who don’t speak Portuguese.
If I wanted to visit a foreign-language community (2ch for example), I had three choices - learn the language, use guides (Google, Babelfish, etc), or go on its English equivalent (4chan in this case). Sure, the two may not be the exact same, but too bad for me. Same with NicoNico Douga - either learn the rules, or don’t use it.
And even then if poeple wanted content from a foreign-language community, there’s always translators who can help. If there is enough demand for it, translators can translate content into their native tongue (as done with many Touhou yukkuri stuff).
tl;dr The Internet works differently from the real world, forums should be in one language to prevent redundant paragraphs for the convenience of most of its userbase. Those who want foreign content ought to either learn the language, or seek translators for their own forum.
Also, it should not be at the burden of the website to provide services in different languages, mainly because forums are NOT government departments responsible for citizens’ basic needs or businesses.
Obviously this isn’t exactly the most interesting period for newscasting. I say this because you haven’t been involved in the community at all, and from just witnessing this, you go ahead and launch a spree to find anything you find discriminating. There are many forums which predominantly speak one language other than english. If you join and don’t use a translator, you get thrown out.
No one is every not allowed to join the forum because they don’t speak english. If they don’t use a translator so that everyone can understand, it’s not about whether they should be there or not, but seriously what’s the point if no one understands them?
Seriously, what is the point?
I don’t belive in denying visitors that can’t speak english. Look at the site. Enjoy.
BUT if you are going to post, and English is not your first language, you need to make sure what you type can be read in and understood in English, to a point. If someone is making a good enough attempt, AND are clearly stating that English isn’t thier first language, okay. Sure. Folks are probably going to be asking what they are trying to say time and time again, but it’s an attempt.
But if they’re not using English AT ALL, well, yeah, then you need to kinda step in there and go “English, Please’ on a predominatly English Website.
I do not belive it is a Websites responsibility to provide moderators, or adminstrators, who can speak other languages //when// thier website is intended for one language only.