The World Is Smaller Now

Twitter has released an option to translate the language of tweets around the world to your native language. At first thought, this isn't really a big deal. We've been able to translate web pages for years, why does this matter?

The people who publish the web sites we can translate are, for the most part, professionals in a particular field. This means the site performs a very specific task, and shares very specific information.

Having automatically translated twitter feeds brings the world closer yet to full globalization. We can't think of this as a change that means you know what someone in France is eating for breakfast. This is interesting at first, but wears quickly. What's far more interesting is that we know what information people around the world are spreading. News will be spread faster than ever before, and from anywhere. Twitter has become, more than ever before, a global news feed.

No longer will we have to rely on CNN, the BBC, the Associated Press, or any other worldwide news network to know what's going on in the world. What we had before from English speaking countries will now be received from everywhere. We won't be viewing world events from the eyes of organizations that may have biased spins (intentionally or unintentionally) anymore, but a vast amount of personal accounts with which we can form our own opinions.

Of course, there are going to be issues. Twitter users in Italy misspell words and use slang as often as those of us in the US. That said, it's still a start, and an exciting one.