Website, you know me. Why serve me a new language?

Question

When traveling or living in multiple locations in the world, I often encounter the problem of websites that insist on serving me the local language (even if I am logged in and they know my origin).These sites obviously are itnernationalized, as they can present content in at least 3+ languages. But still, I have to struggle to find ways to get them to serve me in English, with the currency of my choice. On the currency, I can adjust or mentally calculate. But on the language, it is too tedious to translate everything.Why is it this way? Shouldn't it be possible to localize based on logged-in-user preference?

cratermoon · Accepted Answer

It's really fun with map software. When in a foreign country, the UI shouldn't switch to the language of that country, without your permission. But it does need to show you place names in the local language.

stncls · Answer

There are lots of dirty tricks to determine the user's preferred language, which work for 95% of the population, and unfortunately are sometimes very frustrating for the rest.
For example, some browsers default to en-US, so as a response, websites (mainly: google) ignore that locale and fall back to geoip-based guessing in that case.
One workaround is to explicitly set a locale other than en-US, yet an acceptable one. I personally choose en-CA. One side-benefit is SI measurement units.

high_pathetic · Answer

On the same/similar topic: advertisers, you know me. I've never clicked an ad. Why serve me ads?

taubek · Answer

I guess that they are use IP geo based approach to translation; you get content based on your IP address.