> On Nov 11, 2016, at 12:42 AM, Reynold Xin <r...@apache.org> wrote: > I'd avoid using the argument that English will bring more users, as it is not > defensible and risk being interpreted as western arrogance. Afterall, three > out of the six largest Internet companies (by market cap) are currently in > mainland China, and they all have enormous daily active users even though > they are targeting primarily Chinese.
The world is much bigger than a discussion for where the largest ISPs reside. ;-) Lets not degrade this discussion into an argument about whose country is the best. That does nobody any good and its straw man. I think you are the one being defensive and if you read what I said, as I stated it pretty clear in my first few sentences and through out my statement. Read it again. That was certainly *not* my argument and my argument was most *definitely* defensible. I never said English will bring in more users than China. I *did* say that if you want more international/cross-border users, you will need to use a more international language. Outside of China I will also say that the rest of the world mostly does not know Chinese. For the record, I am a messaging lover. I am a committer/PMC on ActiveMQ, and I love to play with Kafka and other MQs outside the ASF such as RabbitMQ. I can honestly tell you directly that if your discussions are in Chinese, I will likely never play with your software. Now based on your tone, I am guessing that likely you do not care. That is fine. But there are a lot of folks who will be in the same boat as me. *You* need to define on who your want your audience to be. You can call me (and others who don’t speak Chinese) western “arrogance” because our main language is an international one. But it’s not going to change your situation or position. I’m not really sure of why you are coming to members@ asking advice, then getting defensive to those about answers that you don’t want to hear. What responses were you looking for? Were you looking that the rest of the members who mostly don’t speak Chinese to answer that its a great idea? If this is the attitude you will take, then you are wasting our time in attempting to answer you. Jeff > > > On Thu, Nov 10, 2016 at 11:14 PM, Jeff Genender <jgenen...@apache.org > <mailto:jgenen...@apache.org>> wrote: > I would think that English is generally used because its the most > international language, not because its the most used in the world. Thus it > helps cross borders for communication. At the end of the day, I think you > need to look at your community and ask if you want it to cross borders or > not. Do you want worldwide contribution (and adoption)? I can tell you that > I glean a lot of information from the mail lists when I run into problems or > issues using Apache software. If the discussions are in Chinese, you may > miss a lot of people who can be a part of the discussion from outside of > China. I think you really need to think about who you want your users to be > and how you want your product adopted. > > In addition, this is an incubated project. AFAICT, the champion doesn’t > speak Chinese, and I am wild-guessing maybe 2 of the mentors do. This means > the other mentors may have a difficult time steering the project when they > are needed. It makes it difficult for the champion to asses any problems > without having someone notify him of a translated issue. In the unlikely > event that the project requires input from the incubation PMC or, the board > for that matter, it would be very difficult to get a proper insight into the > issues without have solid knowledge of the language. > > I personally don’t know of any rule or regulation that locks down a language > and perhaps a board member can chime in on that. But my .02 is that if I > were bringing a project to Apache, my thoughts about community would be > getting as many people and users involved as possible. If you don’t use a > more cross-border/international language, then I believe that you may > ultimately be hindering your project beyond your borders. I think that would > be a shame. OTOH, maybe your desire is to keep RocketMQ a Chinese piece of > software. I guess that is ok too… but I would be interested in why. > > Just my usual .02. > > Jeff > > > On Nov 10, 2016, at 11:53 PM, Tom Barber <t...@spicule.co.uk > > <mailto:t...@spicule.co.uk>> wrote: > > > > I believe I saw something the other day where someone was talking about > > diverse languages on mailing lists. personally I think it's okay but > > obviously it decreases the chance of participation of others. > > > > of course the old saying "if it wasn't discussed on the list it never > > happened" didn't mention the language. > > > > Thought must be taken for jira and code comments as well. how would non > > Chinese speaking people follow development? > > > > > > On 11 Nov 2016 06:45, "Reynold Xin" <r...@apache.org > > <mailto:r...@apache.org> <mailto:r...@apache.org <mailto:r...@apache.org>>> > > wrote: > > Adding members@ > > > > On Thu, Nov 10, 2016 at 10:40 PM, Reynold Xin <r...@apache.org > > <mailto:r...@apache.org> <mailto:r...@apache.org <mailto:r...@apache.org>>> > > wrote: > > > > > To play devil's advocate: is it OK for Apache projects that consist > > > primarily of Chinese developers to communicate in Chinese? Or put it > > > differently -- is it a requirement that all communications must be in > > > English? > > > > > > I can see an inclusiveness argument for having to use English, as English > > > is one of the most common languages. However, many talented software > > > developers in China don't have the sufficient level of proficiency when it > > > comes to English, as the penetration rate of English in China is much > > > lower > > > than other countries. It is as hard for Chinese speakers to learn English > > > as for English speakers to learn Chinese. > > > > > > One can certainly argue forcing everybody to use English will also exclude > > > those Chinese developers, and from the perspective of the number of native > > > speakers, Mandarin (a Chinese dialect) outnumbers English 3 to 1 according > > > to Wikipedia. > > > > > > Similar argument also applies to Japanese, and many other countries, > > > except the number of Chinese speakers is much larger. > > > > >
