Language
Some key work in the process of localisation revolves around language. The exponential rate of language extinction and the possibilities of revitalization are big issues for many groups. Experts tracking indigenous language loss, say that intergenerational use of the mother tongue is the critical issue for vibrancy. No amount of multimedia or web dictionaries or student newspapers can overcome the lack of real use in and by families.
The reigning confusion in terms of evolving Unicode standards for languages that do not use the roman alphabet has been responsible for a completely arbitrary and artificial lag in the development of computer cultures in most areas of the world. This is at it's starkest in South Asia, where one of the worlds most linguistically rich regions, suffers from a poverty of adequate technological support in terms of taking South Asian languages on to new media platforms. This is compounded by the fact that for the professional and cultural elites in this region, who also comprise the worlds third largest group of Anglophones. Besides the question of scripts, fonts and glyphs, also the creation of conceptual categories for working, creating and playing with computers that are able to derive their energy from local ways of doing and thinking need to be considered. Contentious issues emerge. When working with young working class people in a slum in Delhi in a media lab, perhaps there need to be ways of thinking about a desktop environment that does not necessarily derive all its metaphors ('files', 'folders', 'directories') from an antiseptic office environment that these youngsters will never inhabit. Localisation, then would mean being responsive to the everyday conditions of the lives of users, most of whom are not and never will be office workers. Conversely this form radical localisation might preclude the introduction of that same group to this culture and these forms of employment that they often - rightly or wrongly - are looking for. It raises intersting questions how deeply local the code should be.