native language. Thus, the Spanish Language nation
includes not only Spanish and Latin American users, but millions of
Hispanic users in the US, as well as odd places like Spanish-speaking
Morocco."

[In Depth (published in 2000, updated in 2004)]

In 1998, other languages than English began spreading on the web. In
fact, main non-English languages were present nearly from the start.
But most of the web was in English. Then people from all over the world
began having access to the internet, and posting pages in their own
languages. The percentage of the English language began to slowly
decrease from nearly 100% to 90%.

In 1998, Randy Hobler was an internet marketing consultant for
Globalink, a company specialized in language translation software and
services. Previously, Randy worked as a consultant for IBM, Johnson &
Johnson, Burroughs Wellcome, Pepsi, Heublein, and others.

Randy wrote in September 1998: "Because the internet has no national
boundaries, the organization of users is bounded by other criteria
driven by the medium itself. In terms of multilingualism, you have
virtual communities, for example, of what I call 'Language Nations'...
all those people on the internet wherever they may be, for whom a given
language is their native language. Thus, the Spanish Language nation
includes not only Spanish and Latin American users, but millions of
Hispanic users in the US, as well as odd places like Spanish-speaking
Morocco."

In 1999, Jean-Pierre Cloutier was the editor of Chroniques de Cyberie,
a weekly report of internet news. Jean-Pierre wrote in August 1999:
"The web is going to grow in these non English-speaking regions. So we
have to take into account the technical aspects of the medium if we
want to reach these 'new' users. I think it is a pity there are so few
translations of important documents and essays published on the
web -- from English into other languages and vice-versa. (...) The
recent introduction of the internet in regions where it is spreading
raises questions which would be good to read about. When will
Spanish-speaking communications theorists and those speaking other
languages be translated?"

In 1999, Marcel Grangier was the head of the French Section of the
Swiss Federal Government's Central Linguistic Services, which meant he
was in charge of organizing translation matters for the Swiss
government. Marcel wrote in January 1999: "We can see multilingualism
on the internet as a ha