Ok I hope I won’t come off as an ass here. I’m not always the most eloquent.
One thing that was quite grating on Reddit, was how most “global” subreddits were basically defaulting to the USA.
For example, people would ask questions in general question subs - “Can I legally…?” ”Is a teacher allowed to…?", “How much does it cost to…?” and unless they specify the country, you were just supposed to assume it’s the US, with people from other countries keeping such questions to specific subs.
And this is just a bit weird to non-Americans who always need to specify their jurisdiction or place when it’s relevant.
On Reddit it kinda made sense as Americans were almost half of all users, but with Lemmy, anyone can run an instance from wherever.
There is a bunch of instances dedicated to countries or regions.
But Lemmy.world has “world” right there in the title. So don’t assume everyone is from the same place as you.
Don’t get me wrong, I do love the global community! But I also don’t want to get confused and make assumptions.
So all I ask is some of these things:
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If you’re asking the global community a question, making a comment etc., that is specific to some area(s) of the world, always specify the place, even if it seems self-explanatory.
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Similarly, when using generic terms such as “congress”, “conservative”, “west coast” or “health insurance”, keep in mind that lots of countries have those too in some form or another. Specify what you’re talking about.
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Careful with names of places, especially abbreviation. By CA, do you mean Canada or California? Is IN India or Indiana? Is SD an SD card? UK is an university now? And so on. I personally think abbreviation should default to countries or global organizations, if anything - such as UK, EU, UN.
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When creating/managing a community, use the Display Name to specify what you mean. (I won’t call anyone out but I kinda want to…)
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If you see someone making these assumptions, maybe let them know it can be confusing for the others.
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Consider using (or creating) an instance or community that’s more region-specific or interest-specific . I don’t want to kick anyone out, don’t get me wrong, but everyone can subscribe everywhere, so…
I’ve seen instances for many countries (and the US midwest)… But not one for USA as a whole yet. So, just keep in mind the community is global.
Again, sorry if I come off harsh, it’s not my intent, and I don’t even mean to call out people from the US specifically. It’s just that on Reddit, this has often lead to some toxicity (r/USDefaultism and some other “defaultism” subs) and it would be a shame to bring that here as well.
And you know, just to try to avoid confusion.
Thanks for coming to my TED talk.
I wish people would learn and use the ISO 3166 codes for their area. For example, US-DC, GB-LND, AU-ACT, etc. Unambiguous, easy to look up, short to write, etc. Just takes a super quick search. I know it’ll never happen, but standards are great!
Great post. I absolutely agree, this was always a bit weird on reddit. I have seen people getting flamed on PC building subreddits for considering components that were expensive in the US (but where relatively cheaper here in the EU).
It would be great if we can really keep Lemmy a global community!
And vice versa. Someone ridiculed me on Reddit for saying CPUs were still extortionately expensive, until I showed them that the CPU they were referencing cost over double the US price here in Sweden :/
“Just get a used GPU”
Yeah sure, except that in my country the used market sucks and people ask 80% of retail cost.
Some of these comments are ironic or trolling lmao.
English is used as an in-between language for many people. Other countries that exist also use English still exist. Australians can use lemmy. Canadians can use lemmy. People in the UK can use lemmy. So on, and so on.
Imo, those comments say more about the person who is upset. Variety is good, and communication is good. Assumptions lead to a lack of information, and that can make you look really silly. I’m not going to read CA on a Canadian instance and immediately think of California. An Australian reading on an Australian instance probably won’t assume that WA refers to Washington. Clarification is important, and someone asking for it really shouldn’t be all that offensive. The world is a big place, people.
As a non-American I really appreciate this
I 100% agree! As someone from the US I always disliked that even subs which were supposed to be global would default to being US subs unless the poster specified. I too love the idea of a global community and I think that assuming where someone is from kind of takes away from that.
There are about 450 million people who speak English as their primary language. About 300 million of them are American.
If you’re communicating with a stranger in English and you don’t know they’re nationality, the odds are heavily in favor of them being American. Like it or not, we’re the default.
Except that billions of people can communicate in English, so your assumption is completely off. Not everyone speaks only one language or only uses their primary language on the global network.
Your assumption is completely off. My assumption is completely correct. I was talking about native speakers, as I clearly stated in my post. Your assumption that I meant to include everyone who can speak English is off.
I can speak Spanish. It is correct for someone in a Spanish speaking community to assume I’m from a Spanish speaking nation, because that’s the most likely scenario.
If you read English on the internet it’s more likely that it’s not written by a native speaker, since there are more people who write in English as a secondary language than there are native speakers.
And you can usually tell the ESLs because they usegrammar in an unnatural way, either very stiff and formal or with a heavy dose of influence from their native language.
usegrammar
Ah, so I see English isn’t your first language?
A typographical error is not a grammatical error. It’s nice to see people will always fall back on attacking the person when they don’t have a valid point.
You know, my favorite thing about Lemmy showing both upvotes and downvotes is that not only do we see that a lot of people disagree with you, but more specifically that, since you’re the only one upvoting yourself, literally everyone else can tell that you’re wrong.
You know it’s not that hard to just admit that you were wrong. It was an easy mistake to make, so just admit it and move on. Realize that you can learn and improve. Doubling down just to make yourself seem more like an idiot is never the answer. Everyone is capable of being stupid and making mistakes, but it’s the real idiots who are incapable of learning from them.
Lol dude. Plenty of people who speak English as a second language can speak (and write!) fluently and “naturally” with few errors.
This is confirmation bias. You assume anyone who writes a certain way online is a native speaker, but you have no way of actually knowing that unless they explicitly say so.
I do not assume anyone who writes a certain way online is a native speaker. I assume anyone who writes a certain way is an American. We are the largest group of native English speakers online, especially in forums that aren’t dedicated to a specific country.
I was responding to your claim that you can “usually” tell when English isn’t someone’s first language. You can’t. Unless every comment also states whether English is their native language, there’s no way you can know this. It’s likely there are a ton of people who aren’t native speakers that you don’t detect because they write well enough. Plenty of people are fluent in a second language.
It’s actually closer to 1.5 billion TOTAL speakers of English. Most English speaking people learned it as a second language.
Edit: billion not million
*billion
Thanks. Not sure why I typed that lol
Upset gary ?
Seems like he left since then
