Western Brands on Weibo

The purpose of this article is to list some of the Western Companies/Brands that are using China's Sina Wēibó 新浪微博. Those marked with a ☆ are using the Enterprise version 企业版 which allows open access to all postings. The text in the square brackets is the Sina Wēibó 新浪微博 name. This article is a continuation of schappo.blogspot.co.uk/2011/08/companies-on-sina.html

Note: If the links listed below do not work for you then please visit my China Blog blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_6fab5412010130zq.html where the links will work just fine.

1. 7 For All Mankind [@7ForAllMankind] weibo.com/7forallmankind ☆
2. Abercrombie & Fitch [@Abercrombie] weibo.com/abercrombieny ☆
3. AKG [@雅登-AKG中国] weibo.com/akgchina ☆
4. AkzoNobel [@阿克苏诺贝尔中国] weibo.com/akzonobelinchina ☆
5. Alberta Ferretti [@AlbertaFerretti] weibo.com/albertaferretti ☆
6. ALDO [@ALDO1972] weibo.com/n/ALDO1972 ☆
7. Alpenliebe [@微有爱] weibo.com/alpenliebekindness ☆
8. Associated Press [@美联社] weibo.com/apimages ☆
9. Aston Martin [@阿斯顿马丁拉共达] weibo.com/astonmartinlagondacn ☆
10. Balmain [@瑞士宝曼手表] weibo.com/balmainwatches ☆
11. BASF [@巴斯夫大中华] weibo.com/basfinchina ☆
12. Bayer [@拜耳中国官方微博] weibo.com/bayerchina ☆
13. Best Buy [@BestBuy百思买] weibo.com/bestbuycn ☆
14. Bobbi Brown [@BobbiBrownChina] weibo.com/bobbibrownchina ☆
15. Breitling [@百年灵BREITLING] weibo.com/breitlingchina ☆
16. British Airways [@英国航空公司-推广活动] weibo.com/britishairways ☆
17. BVLGARI [@BVLGARI宝格丽] weibo.com/bulgari ☆
18. BVLGARI Perfume [@宝格丽香水] weibo.com/bulgariperfume ☆
19. Caterpillar [@Caterpillar官方微博] weibo.com/caterpillarinchina ☆
20. Ducati [@杜卡迪中国] weibo.com/ducatichina ☆
21. Dulux [@多乐士Lets_Colour] weibo.com/letscolor ☆
22. DuPont [@杜邦公司] weibo.com/dupont ☆
23. Elizabeth Arden [@伊丽莎白雅顿美丽沙龙] weibo.com/elizabetharden ☆
24. Eppendorf [@eppendorf官方微博] weibo.com/eppendorfchina ☆
25. Furla [@Furla_孚勒] weibo.com/furlaofficial ☆
26. Girard-Perregaux [@GP芝柏表] weibo.com/gpchina ☆
27. GNC [@GNCLiveWell] weibo.com/gnclivewell ☆
28. GRAFF [@格拉夫GRAFF] weibo.com/graff ☆
29. Grey Goose [@法国灰雁GreyGoose] weibo.com/greygoosechina ☆
30. Halma [@HALMA中国] weibo.com/halma ☆
31. Harry Winston [@海瑞温斯顿HarryWinston] weibo.com/harrywinston ☆
32. Hasbro [@孩之宝中国] weibo.com/hasbrochina ☆
33. Hollister [@Hollister] weibo.com/hollistercalifornia ☆
34. Hublot [@宇舶表] weibo.com/hublothanhan ☆
35. IMAX [@IMAX] weibo.com/imax ☆
36. IWC [@IWC万国表] weibo.com/iwcchina ☆
37. Jack Wolfskin [@JackWolfskin官方微博] weibo.com/jackwolfskingermany ☆
38. Lana Marks [@LANA-MARKS-CHINA] weibo.com/lanamarks ☆
39. Lancaster [@兰嘉丝汀] weibo.com/lancasterchina ☆
40. Maria Luisa [@MARIA_LUISA] weibo.com/marialuisa ☆
41. Marimekko [@MARIMEKKO_玛莉美歌] weibo.com/marimekkoofficial ☆
42. Marvin Watches [@Marvin-瑞士摩纹表] weibo.com/marvinwatch ☆
43. Media Markt [@万得城电器] weibo.com/mediamarktchina ☆
44. Mettler Toledo [@梅特勒-托利多中国] weibo.com/mettlertoledo ☆
45. Monster Cable [@Monster-魔声中国] weibo.com/monsterchina ☆
46. Movado [@摩凡陀Movado] weibo.com/movado ☆
47. NERF [@孩之宝NERF-热火] weibo.com/ilovenerf ☆
48. Nuxe Paris [@Nuxe欧树] weibo.com/nuxe ☆
49. Paula's Choice [@PaulasChoice宝拉珍选] weibo.com/paulaschoice01 ☆
50. Perficient [@博克软件] weibo.com/perficientchina ☆
51. Piaget [@PIAGET] weibo.com/piaget ☆
52. Pineider [@彼耐德Pineider] weibo.com/pineider ☆
53. Pizza Hut [@必胜客欢乐餐厅] weibo.com/pizzahut ☆
54. Pomellato [@Pomellato宝曼兰朵] weibo.com/pomellatoinchina ☆
55. Printemps [@春天百货Printemps] weibo.com/printempsparis ☆
56. Pull-in [@PULLIN内衣] weibo.com/pullinasia ☆
57. Roger Dubuis [@罗杰杜彼RogerDubuis] weibo.com/rogerdubuis ☆
58. Rupert Sanderson [@RupertSanderson] weibo.com/rupertsanderson ☆
59. Sergio Rossi [@sergio_rossi] weibo.com/sergiorossi ☆
60. Shopbop [@shopbop] weibo.com/shopbopchina ☆
61. Sigma-Aldrich [@SigmaAldrich] weibo.com/sigmaaldrich ☆
62. Standard Chartered Bank [@渣打银行中国] weibo.com/scbmainlandchina ☆
63. Stiebel Eltron [@斯宝亚创StiebelEltron] weibo.com/stiebeleltron ☆
64. Stroili Oro [@StroiliOro] weibo.com/stroilioro ☆
65. TAG Heuer [@豪雅TAGHeuer] weibo.com/tagheuerchina ☆
66. Thermo Fisher Scientific [@赛默飞] weibo.com/thermofishercn ☆
67. Toblerone [@瑞士三角巧克力] weibo.com/toblerone ☆
68. Tom & Jerry [@华纳兄弟-猫和老鼠] weibo.com/tomandjerryoffical ☆
69. Topshop Shēnzhèn [@TOPSHOP深圳] weibo.com/topshopsz ☆
70. Van Cleef & Arples [@VanCleefArpels梵克雅宝] weibo.com/vancleefarpelschina ☆
71. Yves Rocher [@Yves-Rocher伊夫黎雪] weibo.com/yvesrocher1959 ☆
72. Zenith [@ZENITH真力时] weibo.com/zenithchina ☆

MSc International Computing for the Internet

Computer Science at Loughborough University ラフバラ大学 now has a new MSc programme entitled International Computing for the Internet. This MSc will start 1st October 2012.

I am responsible for and will be teaching two of the modules:

1. International Computing
2. Implementing Internationalized Systems

Additionally, I will be involved in two of the other modules:

1. Essential Skills for Computing: I will be sharing the teaching with another tutor
2. Internationalized Project: These will be individual projects and I will be supervising some of them

Further information available from www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/co/postgrad/ici.html

Language Characteristics

In this article I list some of the characteristics of natural languages and scripts as they are manifested and used in modern day IT. With languages there are always exceptions and so there will be some exceptions to these characteristics. I will not be delving into linguistic technicalities such as the distinction between mora and syllable or the distinction between logogram and ideogram. I will take a more broad brush approach.

Arabic

1. Arabic is written in the Arabic script
2. Written from right to left
3. The space character (U+0020 SPACE) is used as a separator between words and sentences
4. The sentence terminator full stop is the Unicode character U+002E FULL STOP
5. Unicase ie no uppercase and lowercase letter forms
6. A Keyboard Mapping is sufficient in order to write Arabic
7. The Arabic script is inherently cursive and hence is presented/displayed in it's cursive form.
8. Letters change shape according to their position within a word. These different shapes are named Initial, Medial, Final and Isolated forms. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_alphabet#Letter_forms

Chinese

1. Chinese is written in the Chinese script which consists of hànzì (汉字) characters, of which, there are tens of thousands
2. Written from left to right. Once browsers implement CSS3 Writing Modes we may well see some return to the traditional vertical text in webpages dev.w3.org/csswg/css3-writing-modes/#vertical-intro
3. There is no space character separator between words and sentences
4. The sentence terminator full stop is the Unicode character U+3002 IDEOGRAPHIC FULL STOP
5. Unicase ie no uppercase and lowercase letter forms
6. An Input Method is required in order to write Chinese
7. All characters, including punctuation, are monospaced. Thus, for example, the list items separator in the text string "北京，南京，东京" is the single character U+FF0C FULLWIDTH COMMA. The text string "北京、南京、东京" uses the single character U+3001 IDEOGRAPHIC COMMA as the list items separator.
8. With respect to number of characters required to communicate, Chinese is much more compact than English. Given a sentence written in English, the same sentence written in Chinese would require far fewer characters. This compactness gives Chinese a significant advantage over English for IDNs and when microblogging.

English

1. English is written in the Latin script
2. Written from left to right
3. The space character (U+0020 SPACE) is used as a separator between words and sentences
4. The sentence terminator full stop is the Unicode character U+002E FULL STOP
5. Has uppercase and lowercase letter forms
6. A Keyboard Mapping is sufficient in order to write English

Japanese

1. Japanese is written in the Japanese scripts Kanji (漢字), Hiragana (ひらがな) and Katakana (カタカナ)
2. Written from left to right. Once browsers implement CSS3 Writing Modes we may well see some return to the traditional vertical text in webpages dev.w3.org/csswg/css3-writing-modes/#vertical-intro
3. There is no space character separator between words and sentences
4. The sentence terminator full stop is the Unicode character U+3002 IDEOGRAPHIC FULL STOP
5. Unicase ie no uppercase and lowercase letter forms. Uppercase is sometimes used for emphasis in English. Similarly, Katakana is sometimes used for emphasis.
6. An Input Method is required in order to write Japanese
7. In general, Japanese, like Chinese is monospaced. The exception is that there are half-width forms of Katakana and some punctuation characters. The half-width forms are in Unicode block Half-width and Full-width Forms U+FF00 ➤ U+FFEF.
8. With respect to number of characters required to communicate, Japanese is much more compact than English. Given a sentence written in English, the same sentence written in Japanese would require far fewer characters. This compactness gives Japanese a significant advantage over English for IDNs and when microblogging.

Korean

1. Korean is written in the Hangeul (한글) script
2. Written from left to right
3. The space character (U+0020 SPACE) is used as a separator between words and sentences
4. The sentence terminator full stop is the Unicode character U+002E FULL STOP
5. Unicase ie no uppercase and lowercase letter forms
6. An Input Method is required in order to write Korean
7. The individual Korean letters (jamo/자모) are grouped into and displayed as Syllabic blocks. e.g. the individual jamo ㅎ ㅏ ㄴ ㄱ ㅜ ㄱ are combined to form the two Korean characters 한국

Russian

1. Russian is written in the Cyrillic (Кириллица) script
2. Written from left to right
3. The space character (U+0020 SPACE) is used as a separator between words and sentences
4. The sentence terminator full stop is the Unicode character U+002E FULL STOP
5. Has uppercase and lowercase letter forms
6. A Keyboard Mapping is sufficient in order to write Russian

Browser Language

By Browser Language I do not mean the Browser User Interface Language. I am referring to the Browser Preferred Language for displaying Pages. I will use the acronym BL to mean Browser preferred Language for displaying pages.

An internationalised website will have pages in multiple languages. These pages can be displayed according to BL eg If BL is Korean then the website will send it's Korean pages to the browser.

With most browsers, the BL can be set in the preferences and can be set independent of the language settings of the OS. Some browsers do inherit their BL from the OS language setting.

This ability to change the BL has so much potential that few are aware of. Google are switched on to this potential. Google maps, if embedded correctly, will automatically adapt to BL. You can try it out for yourself. Visit lboro.ac.uk/about/findus.html and you will see a Google map of Loughborough. Now change the BL in your browser preferences and refresh. You will see menus displayed in the BL you chose. If you had chosen Japanese as your BL you would also see some place names transliterated into Japanese.

This ability for the user to change BL is a good thing, a very good thing. But... This function is buried down in the preferences. It is my experience that few people are aware that the BL can be changed and even less are aware of the possibilities this opens up.

My recommendation to all the browser manufacturers is that the BL preferences should be made manifest by bringing them up front. Put a BL graphic in a prominent position on the browser window so that it is always visible. This BL graphic will serve to inform the user of the current BL and allow the user to change the BL (eg a popup BL selection menu).

Such a BL graphic will:

• Raise user awareness of BL and the ability to change BL
• Encourage users to explore sites that adapt according to BL
• Encourage web developers to incorporate content, widgets and features that are BL adaptive

Here is an illustrative story. About a year ago, a Chinese person told me he had a problem when viewing some Google maps. His problem was that the map info was displayed in Chinese but he wanted to see the info displayed in English. This problem occurred when he viewed these maps from his own computer and he could not work out how to view the info in English.

I explained to him that what he was experiencing was not a problem but rather a symptom of a very powerful feature. The feature being Google maps auto adapting to BL. His Computer had a Chinese OS and the browser he used had it's BL set to Chinese. I told him how to change his browser's BL and then, of course, he could view the Google map info in any of the many supported languages.

A manifest BL graphic would have made it obvious what was happening and would have enabled him to explore and appreciate Google maps BL adaption and BL adaptive websites in general.

Microblog Space (character) Saving

Take the following example two lines of text:

• Fruit: apples, pears! Veg: cabbage, onions. Cars? Ford; Mini
• Fruit：apples，pears！Veg：cabbage，onions．Cars？Ford；Mini

Line 1 has 60 characters and line 2 has 52 characters. I reduced the number of characters by using full-width punctuation characters. These full-width forms start at Unicode codepoint U+FF01. Using full-width forms I can dispense with the space character. So, for example, instead of colon + space I use full-width colon only. For microblog posts small space savings like this can be very useful.

I could, and sometimes do, use OSX Character Viewer to obtain these full-width punctuation characters. When I am microblogging in English I toggle to the Simplified Pinyin Input Method to write the full-width punctuation. This may sound complicated and time consuming but with a little practice it is easy and quick and does not disrupt the flow of writing. There is one exception character. When I type full stop whilst in the OSX Simplified Pinyin Input Method the ideographic full stop is produced rather than the full-width full stop. That is what I would expect and still saves me a space character. So, when I am microblogging I would write the example text, above, as:

• Fruit：apples，pears！Veg：cabbage，onions。Cars？Ford；Mini

Sometimes I use my OSX Japanese Input Method for microblog punctuation. The one difference is that when typing comma the ideographic comma is produced. i.e.

• Fruit：apples、pears！Veg：cabbage、onions。Cars？Ford；Mini

English is my primary language and, as such, my examples are in English. The same space saving technique can be used for any language/script that uses the standard ASCII punctuation e.g. Korean & Russian

My setup is OSX Lion with the standard Input Methods. I have setup a keyboard shortcut (Control + Space) to quickly toggle between a pair of languages. When microblogging my toggle pairs are English & Chinese or English & Japanese. Your setup may well be different to mine and you may well get different results to me. Whatever your setup, you will be able to use the Chinese or Japanese space saving punctuation characters.

ZARA Website

Interesting! And the sort of thing I would do. ZARA's website adapts the Social Media links displayed according to the Region. ZARA caters for multiple regions and for the majority displays a link to their Facebook facebook.com/Zara

There are some regions for which it displays a link to that region's Social Media:

China 中国: Zara's China landing page is zara.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/home/cn/zh/zara-I2011 and the displayed Social Media link is Sina Wēibó 新浪微博 weibo.com/zarachina

Russia Россия: Zara's Russia landing page is zara.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/home/ru/ru/zara-I2011 and the displayed Social Media link is Vkontakte ВКонтакте vk.com/zara

With their Japan landing page it appears that the intention is to link to a Zara twitter as indicated by the displayed text on zara.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/home/jp/ja/zara-jp-W2011 The link does not though resolve to a Zara Twitter or indeed any Twitter.

AI Website Adaptations

Work in Progress

AI in this case means Adaptive Internationalised.

1. BL = Browser preferred display Language as set in browser preferences or inherited from the OS.
2. BR = Browser Region
3. BD = Browser Date
4. BT = Browser Time

Adverts: In it's simplest and now quite commonplace form, adverts on websites will adapt according to BR. When browsing, I frequently see adverts localized to the midlands of England which is where I most usually browse. One can also incorporate BL by having different language versions of the advert. When adapting to both BR and BL then one can also culturally style the advert according to BR. Many adverts display for a fixed period of time. These adverts could be seasonal or for the duration of a campaign. Thus the adverts can also be adapted according to BD and maybe in the case of short term special offers, according to BT.

Background: Many websites have a fixed width area for webpage content. The area outside the content is the background I am referring to. This background can be used creatively from an AI perspective. The background could adapt to BR with, for example, iconic images of a region. The background for region China could, for instance, be a collage of images such as the Forbidden City, qípáo and Chinese Lanterns. The background could also adapt to BR + BD by incorporating festivals. A more contemporary approach would be to incorporate images of the latest fashions and memes. One such China Meme is: Dù Fǔ is busy 杜甫很忙. There is much creative scope to make the background interesting, eye catching and ever changing using  AI techniques.

Censorship: By this I mean self censorship according to BR. There are regions in which some content could, for example, be politically sensitive. An AI website can be self censoring and restrict or modify content for some regions.

Date Format: Regions can have different formats for dates and so date formatting would be according to BR. The following illustrative examples use the date 10th November 2011, as per the Gregorian Calendar:

1. Japan ➠ 2011年11月10日
2. Russia ➠ 10.11.2011
3. UK ➠ 10/11/2011
4. USA ➠ 11/10/11

Festivals: There are many festivals celebrated in different parts of the world. There are a small number of festivals, such as Christmas, which are celebrated in most parts of the world. Most festivals are regional. Festivals would be displayed according to BR and BD. The festival information displayed could be translated according to BL. If BL is not the native language of or predominant language in BR then one could reasonably assume that the person browsing may not be familiar with the festival, hence, one could provide additional information. This additional information could, for example, be an explanation of the history, customs and traditions of the festival

1. Chinese Festivals/Holidays: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_festivals
2. Japanese Festivals/Holidays: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_festivals
3. Korean Festivals/Holidays: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Festivals_of_Korea & english.visitkorea.or.kr/festival/eng/korea_festival.html

Flags: Display of flags should be according to BR. I agree with flagsarenotlanguages.com/blog/ that flags should not be used to represent languages and so should not be according to BL. If you still want to use flags to represent language then one should consider that many countries can share a common official language. English, for example, is the official language of many countries. Invariably, I see the UK or American flag to represent English. The flag used to represent English could be according to BR eg when BR is Australia then use the Australian flag to represent English.

Forms: There are several considerations when implementing AI web forms. Text labels on forms could be written according to BL. When a form requires user input of a postal address then said address input format should be according to BR. In the UK postal addresses are ordered minor to major and in China, major to minor when written in Chinese en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Address.... Personal names are also a consideration for form design. In the UK, full names start with a Given name ad in China full names start with the Family name www.w3.org/International/questions/qa-personal-names. If a form requests a web address then it should be able to correctly and natively handle IDNs schappo.blogspot.com/2011/08/chinese-companies-5.html

Maps: Embedded Google maps, if set up correctly, will auto adapt according to BL. If your embedded code contains hl=xx where xx is a language tag then simply remove and the map will then auto adapt to BL. Google maps will display menus and information according to BL. When BL is Japanese, Korean or Russian it will display the transliterated/translated place/street names. Most Impressive. By way of example, here are Google maps of Loughborough, ラフバラ, 러프버러 and Лафборо. When BL is Chinese (language tag zh-CN) place names are displayed in Chinese but not street names: 拉夫堡. The map service used could, where appropriate, be regional and hence according to BR. A Japanese map service is goo  eg  link.maps.goo.ne.jp/map.php?MAP=E139.46.23.658N35.40.31.302&ZM=2 Daum is a Korean map service eg local.daum.net/map/index.jsp?map_type=TYPE_MAP.... Russia's Yandex has a map service eg maps.yandex.ru/?ll=-... In a previous  article I described three Chinese map services schappo.blogspot.com/2011/03/baidu-3d-maps.html

News: News would be according to BR. There is the consideration of the region scope of news displayed. One could display National or City/Town news. Alternatively one could simultaneously have an International news section, a National news section and a  (nearest) City/Town news section. Furthermore one could adapt the news items to BL by having these news items translated according to BL. News items are inherently subject to BD and BT.

Star Ratings: Star ratings are a common method for indicating quality. Usually there are between 0 and 5 stars awarded, with 5 stars being the best. One could replace the star symbol with a BR relevant symbol. In the case of England, the symbol used in place of the star could, for instance, be an image of Big Ben.

Twitter: Using the twitter Search Widget one can embed a live twitter feed in which the tweets displayed will be determined by search keyword(s) twitter.com/about/resources/widgets/widget_search. These keywords can be dynamically changed to produce a live AI twitter feed. Lets take the single search keyword chocolate. When BL is English set the keyword to chocolate. When BL is Japanese set the keyword to チョコレート.  In this case the twitter feed is being adapted to BL, hence different tweets will be displayed. Other combinations could, for example, include:

1. When BL = Japanese & BR = Loughborough, then set keyword to ラフバラ
2. When BL = English & BR = Loughborough & BD = 9th November ⇰ 12th November 2011, then set keywords to street fair
3. When BL = Japanese & BD = 1st December ⇰ 25th December, then set keyword to クリスマス

URL: A URL path can be rewritten according to BL. Given a URL of the form:

• http://domain-name/learn/webfonts/unicode6.html

This could be rewritten into Japanese as:

• http://domain-name/習う/ウェブフォント/ユニコード6.html

With Unix it is relatively straight forward to set up a set of directory/file names in different languages that all resolve to a master directory/file using the ln command. The syntax for one of the forms of this command is:

• ln [options] target link-name

So, given the directory webfonts, one can create a japanese named symbolic link to it with the ln command:

• ln -s webfonts ウェブフォント

Here is a working URL with the path rewritten in Korean. As I am not administrator for the server I am restricted to what I can rewrite. I have rewritten as much of the path as I can as a standard user.

• co-project.lboro.ac.uk/users/coas/배우다/웹글꼴/유니코드6.html

Given that one registers a set of IDNs in different languages/scripts for the website then one can also rewrite the domain name part of the URL according to BL.