Hacker News Reader

Comment by madawan | Hacker News Reader

Why are you speaking Chinese on an English newsboard?

It's not very polite to respond in a different language as the question, especially when it cannot be presumed everyone will understand you.

View on HN

>Why are you speaking Chinese on an English newsboard? It's not very polite to respond in a different language as the question, especially when it cannot be presumed everyone will understand you.

But it fits in with the current discussion, and I think is in the spirit or this particular thread.

Being able to read English is a different skill from being able to write it. A lot of the Chinese students I know can understand it mostly fine but have trouble writing coherently for an English reader.

I think in times of google translate that's not true anymore. Anyway it might be the only way for him to respond. If you feel uncomfortable communicating in Chinese I can completely understand that (I spend a year in China without many previous Chinese skills) but it's not a huge problem if it just happens here and there. Let him communicate to us this way. There are people here who can speak Chinese to him back. And he seems to be able to read English, so you don't have to use Chinese. :)

Et donc moi aussie je peux utiliser n'importe quelle langue? /s

Si on vas tous utiliser Google Translate, on va commencer à parler comme des logiciels. Moi en faite je préfère parler avec des humains. On fait tous l'effort.

At least get the grammar right, please!

I think he might have just Google translated that and thereby ignored the point that I wanted the reader to translate, not the writer.

I really, really have a hard time getting your point. Do you feel you talk to me via a machine, i.e. Translate? But I used it to understand what you are saying, because I don't speak much French. But it's possible for me to respond to you, because thanks to Translate I do in fact understand some of what you want to say. Because of that tool, you and I can talk even though you used a language that I don't understand very well. Did you want to proof my point? Because that's what happened, I think.

In the times of Google Translate, it would be easier for him to translate what he's saying and post it here rather than the thousands of English speakers here having to translate it.

Anyone is free to respond any way they want, but the point remains it is an English-language forum and complaining that someone is not posting in English is a perfectly valid criticism.

No, Google Translate usually gives out shitty translations, meaning that the information will be actually lost.

If they post in their native language, maybe someone goes along and translates it properly, meaning the information can be fully restored.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com