The other day I came across the website above that retail the German & Japanese RC1 version of Windows Vista. You may wonder, why Microsoft selected German & Japanese amongst many languages? Why not French, Mandarin, Korean, and etc.? Why German & Japanese got that kind of premium services? In attempting to find out the answer, I did came across some sources stated that both German & Japanese are complicated and hard to read and write. Thus, in theoretical if translating a software to German & Japanese, if that’s work well, so it would work for the other languages as well.

In technological setting, my sense is that it is unfair for the German & Japanese languages. I strongly believed the reason Microsoft launched German, Japanese versions besides English version was based on the consideration of the competitive advantage of nation, Per capita GDP, and purchasing power of these two countries, i.e. Germany & Japan.

As according to moneyweek.com, the United States, Japan, and Germany still collectively account for 43% of world GDP as measured in dollar-based market exchange rates. In particular, German business competitiveness is ranked second only to the United States and well above that of the UK (#8) and Japan (#9) — to say nothing of France (#16), Spain (#30), and Italy (#38). This explained why the Germans and Japanese would enjoy the privilege of using Windows Vista in their own language first.

Bottom Line: If you are considering translating a software to other languages other than English, consider the above factors such as competitive advantage of nation, Per capita GDP, and etc. Doing so is just good business.