Languages

Running a successful Facebook page is often more about science and accuracy than about socializing. You probably already know this from your personal page: You can post great content at the wrong time or under an unattractive title, and it will hardly be noticed. The AutoCAD WS application Facebook fan page now exceeds 200,000 fans (for a business-to-business app; not a company). I had the honor of working on that fan page from the “create new page” step to the point when it reached 100,000 fans. During that time, I learned a lot, namely that simple tweaks and tricks can leverage your content significantly.

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English is still the most widely spoken language on Facebook, but a new challenger is rising. According to statistics from Socialbakers, a growing number of new users speak Portuguese, the third-most-popular language on the social network.

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Brands that have an international presence just got a major boost, courtesy of Facebook. The site announced Wednesday Global Pages for companies that want to reach out to consumers in other countries. Through this new layout, brands can establish one global identity.

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The list of companies that offer analytics for businesses on Facebook seems to expand on a daily basis, but data analyzer Stephen Wolfram and his company, Wolfram|Alpha, are offering Facebook users a detailed look at their personal analytics on the social network, free of charge.

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Facebook mobile users in India are no longer limited to English, as the social network launched support for 10 new languages in the country.

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How do you like this: Some languages might be more conducive to Facebook likes than others.

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Yesterday Facebook released the lite version of their site in all of the languages currently available through the Translations application. Given that the company supposedly released this version of the site to target those individuals with slower internet access, it only makes sense that they roll out all the remaining languages as quickly as possible. However the existing design and the Facebook Lite version appear to be merging together as one.
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With over 40 languages now available on Facebook, the company has announced availability of the site in both Hebrew and Arabic. If you haven’t tested out the site in either of these languages, I highly recommend it as the site is flipped backwards. There was a huge demand for the site to be translated into Arabic and numerous friends in Israel had complained to me about the site not being in Hebrew.
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This afternoon Facebook wrote that the company had opened an office in France. This announcement coincides with Le Web which started today in Paris, France. Also related to Facebook’s international growth, the site is now available in over 30 languages in contrast to the 22 which were available at the end of October. The numerous languages available are clearly contributing to the company’s rapid international expansion.

France has been rising in popularity for the company with over 6 million active users in the country, which is a whopping 50 percent growth in a little over a month. It’s no wonder that the company is putting resources into the country as it’s quickly becoming one of the largest user bases on Facebook. Perhaps there will eventually be an office in every country if Facebook continues to grow at this pace.

Despite the down economy, Facebook continues to put significant resources into expansion as there is a continuing race for global social network domination. Facebook is in the lead but it’s definitely not time to give up as MySpace and Google are trying to mute some of Facebook’s ongoing successes. There are easily 30 other languages that are currently in beta so Facebook still has a long way to go when it comes to translating the site.

The company launched the Translations application back in March and has now made it’s way through a good portion of all the world’s languages but they still have a long way to go. With each new language comes new users so it will be exciting to see how growth expands with each new language.

Are there any languages that the company hasn’t launched yet that you are still waiting on? Also, if you want to see which languages have been added over the past month, I’ve marked the image on the left with red dots next to each new language.

As of today, Facebook is available in 23 languages (26 if you count derivative versions of each). There are also 7 languages that are in beta, including the recently seen pirate version. The new languages include a number of Asian languages, primarily seen in southeastern Asia, an area currently dominated by Friendster. As Facebook expands its global reach, it is important that the site be available in all languages.

It appears that many of the languages have been translated in relatively the order of popularity. There are still plenty of languages remaining with 63 other languages being actively translated. One interesting language that’s being added is “Leet Speak” which is the language of uber computer geeks. One commenter on the “Leet Speak” translations section wrote:

I’m sure one of the primary points of debate regarding the translations is how far to vulgarize a word when translating into leet. For example, the word “Leet” could be made into anywhere from l33t to 1337 to 1_ [- [- +. Perhaps this language should be subdivided into different levels of, ahem, legibility?

While another one wrote:

533, i pr3f3r 7h3 v3r510n wi7h n0 5ym8015. 0n1y 13773r5 4nd num83r5

It’s great to see that Facebook is at least leveraging their tools for entertainment purposes and not just utility. Then again, has Facebook ever been simply for utility?