h of a multilingual Web?

Very positively. It is true that for all intents and purposes English will
continue to dominate the Web. This is not so bad in my view, in spite of
regional sentiments to the contrary, because we do need a common language to
foster communications between people the world over. That being said, I do not
adopt the doomsday view that other languages will just roll over in submission.
Quite the contrary. The Net can serve, first of all, as a repository of useful
information on minority languages that might otherwise vanish without leaving a
trace. Beyond that, I believe that it provides an incentive for people to learn
languages associated with the cultures about which they are attempting to gather
information. One soon realizes that the language of a people is an essential and
inextricable part of its culture.

From this standpoint, I have much less faith in mechanized tools of language
translation, which render words and phrases but do a poor job of conveying the
soul of a people. Who are the Haitian people, for instance, without "Kreyol"
(Creole for the non-initiated), the language that has evolved and bound various
African tribes transplanted in Haiti during the slavery period? It is the most
palpable exponent of commonality that defines us as a people. However, it is
primarily a spoken language, not a widely written one. I see the Web changing
this situation more so than any traditional means of language dissemination.

In Windows on Haiti, the primary language of the site is English, but one will
equally find a center of lively discussion conducted in "Kreyol". In addition,
one will find documents related to Haiti in French, in the old colonial creole,
and I am open to publishing others in Spanish and other languages. I do not
offer any sort of translation, but multilingualism is alive and well at the
site, and I predict that this will increasingly become the norm throughout the
Web.

= What is your best experience with the Internet?

People. The Web is an interconnected network of servers and personal computers,
at the keyboard of which you will find a person, an individual. This has
afforded me the opportunity of testing my ideas, acquiring new ones, and best of
all, of forging personal friendships with people far away and eventually meeting
them.

= And your worst experience?

People. I do not want to expand on that, but some personalities simply have a
way of getting under your skin.