I'm excited in the way that only a geek who likes languages can be... I turned on my computer yesterday and Google came up in Bangla (Bengali). That shouldn't be too surprising since I live in Bangladesh, but this was a new and surprising trick for my computer. I didn't change anything, but apparently Google started a local server (google.com.bd) which serves up content in UTF-8 encoded Bangla. From talking with friends around the world, it sounds like Google just kicked off a slew of these country-specific search engines.
I'm country director of the Global Connections and Exchange Project (GCEP) in Bangladesh, a project which aims to introduce computer and internet technology into schools, and to promote intercultural lessons via the internet. Last year, we put up a website in UTF-8 encoded Bangla. For fun, I tried to find it...a little ego surfing -- I typed the name of my organization into the search engine in Bangla: "relief international" and hit three times. I then tried just "relief" and hit our page; I tried "international" and hit our page. In fact, as I broadened the search terms to common items like "school", "site", "link" and a bunch of other common words, I began to realize that there just aren't a lot of websites in Bangla. I'd like to think that our site is super-special (and it, of course, is), but the world's sixth most spoken language is critically under-represented on the internet -- talk about a digital divide. Part of the problem has been standards. One standard is used in India, while a proprietary standard is dominant in Bangladesh. I believe that Unicode Bangla was only finalized around April of last year. With the exception of our project, a few linux-related sites and a few wikipedia entries, the Bangla-language wired world has been a virtual desert. A few developments bode well for Bangla on the internet, though: 1) availability of unicode fonts (for instance, Vrinda which ships with WinXP and a series of open source fonts), 2) availability of browsers that can render unicode Bangla correctly (IE, Firefox, and probably others), and 3) a popular search engine that can find some content in Bangla. Perhaps this last factor will be enough to kick off an explosion of internet use, but a fourth pillar is still missing: a critical mass of content. We've been working on ways to jumpstart Bangla content. Last year, we started the first two Bangla-language projects on the Project Gutenberg, Europe site. We've done a number of collaborative projects between schools in Bangladesh using Bangla-based email and forums, and have developed projects culminating in production of essays, school newspapers and web pages in Bangla, all of which end up on the web. We're hoping to be part of a process to build local language content to the point that casual users can perform a search and find something useful in their own language. We may be a drop in the bucket when it comes to the global picture, but we hope we're a good example to early adapters of Bangla content development. For a brief glimpse of the language and a discussion of how it can be implemented on the internet, I've made a couple pages found at: http://www.connect-bangladesh.org/bangla Our Project Gutenberg projects can be found on the Project Gutenberg Europe site: http://dp.rastko.net/ ================================ Jack Welch, Country Director Relief International - Schools Online, Bangladesh +880-173-032-998 http://www.connect-bangladesh.org The Global Connections and Exchange Program is funded by the US Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, per provisions of the Mutual Educational and Cultural Exchange Act of 1961, as amended. _______________________________________________ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.edc.org/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
