Politech mailing list archives
FC: Yowsa! Web translator upsets humor-impaired, from CNET
From: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
Date: Sat, 03 Jun 2000 07:34:27 -0400
[What's next, the Canadianizer? Mad Magazine? --Declan] http://www.news.com/Perspectives/Column/0,176,444,00.html?st.ne.per.gif.a Yowsa! Web translator upsets humor-impaired June 2, 2000 By Brian Livingston A free Internet service that displays Web sites as if written in hillbilly talk has shut itself down because too many corporations have said, in effect, "It ain't funny." The Dialectizer suspended its service of "translating" Web sites two weeks ago. The service converted entire Web pages into "Redneck, Pig Latin, Elmer Fudd," and other dialects. The conversions didn't change any material on the original site. Instead, a temporary translation was displayed in a new browser window on a user's screen. But the owners of some translated sites were (as the Redneck converter would put it) as ticked off as a weasel in a blender. Viewed through the Dialectizer's hillbilly prism, for example, one well-known corporate slogan becomes, "Th' quality goes in befo'e th' name goes on." Dialectizer creator Samuel Stoddard said in a statement, "It is not worth it to me to sacrifice my peace of mind and fend off the continual onslaught of distraught corporations and Webmasters threatening legal action." [...] -------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- the moderated mailing list of politics and technology To subscribe, visit http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------
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- FC: Yowsa! Web translator upsets humor-impaired, from CNET Declan McCullagh (Jun 03)