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Comment by heffer | Hacker News Reader

US is the default on the internet. So unless explicitly mentioned I tend to assume content is geared to a US audience.

But I did not know Poland was big in apples. Interesting. I noticed the strong regional variances in Apple availability ever since moving to Canada. I have had a very hard time finding an apple that works well for baking, as Boskoop Apples aren't a thing here.

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China and India have more internet users than the US.

Unless you specify, I might assume you're Asian.

(most probably they'd speak English too. I'm gonna say because I think you'd be concerned)

Exactly my point.

ARPANET was developed by neither China nor India.

What does that have to do with anything?

I was defending the right of the US to be "the default on the internet" as stated here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33640903

Neat.

The country of origin doesn't determine the quantity of people using it.

I was defending the right of the US to be "the default on the internet" as stated here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33640903

"First!" usually trumps quantity.

Paper was invented in China

Neat to know!

I think you meant "<My country> is the default on the internet. So unless explicitly mentioned I tend to assume content is geared to a US audience." Because you are American and you tend to visit US-centric sites. No shit.

I am pretty sure 90% of sites visited by Chinese citizens to be hosted in, and tailored towards China.

Also it's not just the Internet being US centric. It's American people being US centric in general, and thus on the Internet make it seem like only US exists. It's more cultural than you think it is.

Wow that got really xenophobic really quick. No need to be so hostile.

Where is the xenophobia? Come on, not every single minor comment you don't agree with is xenophobia.

You might disagree and think I'm wrong. Fine. But there's no need to cry wolf because I said US culture is quite insular. Geez.

I agree with your assessment. I am not US American though. I live in America (Canada specifically) but I was born and raised in Europe. I'm afraid the cynicism in my original comment requires this context to be received.

In my opinion it seems to reflect an expectation in culture in general. Most movies filmed in Canada do not actually depict Canada. I lived in Toronto for a while where there are almost as many NYPD cruisers as there are TPS cruisers and as many Yellow Cabs as there are Beck Taxis. International YouTubers translating things into Imperial Units and US Dollars in videos is another often seen accommodation to this.

I think my simplest heuristic for agreeing with your point is how much content there is in the English Wikipedia vs. other languages. I haven't run the numbers, but I'm sure it's also much more US centric (take a look at the # of articles on the US government (current and historical) vs., say, the Brazilian government...)

America just tends to be particularly prolific in producing online content. No, I'm not claiming this as a statistical fact, but I am claiming that's the impression day in an day out so might as well assume as much...

(Dis)claimer: I'm not American

The US has a larger population than the entirety of western Europe and it's easily the largest western country. I'm not from the US and I'd still consider it the default by sheer size.

There is more to the world and the Internet than US and western Europe.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of...

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