topic Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language in Community Chat

English Must Not Be Their First Language

NickNack — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 00:20:28 GMT

I was reading the description of something on Amazon. It was obviously written by someone whose first language is not English. Here’s part of what I read:

Simple to use.
Clean minimalist design.
Thinner than a Micro SD Card.
They're also super noticeable and unattractive.
However is so small and low profile.

I thought #4 was hilarious. I’m not even sure what they were trying to say.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

deeva — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 00:32:44 GMT

I see this often when the merchandise is made in China.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

Kachina624 — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 00:33:13 GMT

@NickNack. I've seen similar faux pas on ads. They always give me a chuckle.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

Foxxee — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 00:49:41 GMT

Probably one of Amazon's sellers. Whatever this person is trying to sell, #4 will not do the trick. #5 contradicts #4. I hope selling on Amazon isn't their primary means for making a living.

Wonder if Amazon has a department that reads product descriptions before they are posted. Guess not.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

Love my grandkids — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 01:23:45 GMT

Some of the descriptions I've read are hilarious and some make no sense!

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

PickyPicky3 — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 02:05:35 GMT

Computer translation is always improving but still has a long way to go.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

GenXmuse — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 02:18:02 GMT

They can be rather amusing! I try to avoid products with non-sensical verbiage

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

chrystaltree — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 04:52:29 GMT

Sounds like a foreign seller, probably from China. You have to remember Amazon is more than a store, it's a platform. Some products are Amazon's products but many, are not. There are a lot of foreign sellers on Amazon.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

NYCLatinaMe — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 05:35:40 GMT

@NickNack wrote:
I was reading the description of something on Amazon. It was obviously written by someone whose first language is not English. Here’s part of what I read:

Simple to use.
Clean minimalist design.
Thinner than a Micro SD Card.
They're also super noticeable and unattractive.
However is so small and low profile.

I thought #4 was hilarious. I’m not even sure what they were trying to say.

I am not sure why this is noteworthy or funny. I don't know what the product was. If you don't like reading poor English, you can just skip those listings. I shop Amazon for things I need that I can't easily find near me, or that it would be a chore to carry home, since I don't drive. I don't ridicule product descriptions by people who have not mastered English writing.

If the author was trying to help you in a store, would you make fun of her like you did here?

How many languages can you write in?

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

SoX — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 08:29:34 GMT

My guess is it's just a typo ... they probably meant

"They're also super attractive and unnoticeable"

not quite the best way to say it, but ...

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

candys mine — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 09:57:53 GMT

Yet another reason for Proofreading. Admitting that I am not the bes writer. That is amusing on the surface because it is not conveying a helpful message.

More directly is is not amusing because it is directly sabotaging the effort to sell a product.

The Selller has, by not having their add proof read LOST PROFIT.

It is a fact. People will judge. They must make choices to survive and taken at face value, the words of the seller themselves may make people NOT want their product.

If a Million people read that product description and just 25% do not buy it BECAUSE of That Descriptopn that is 250,000 units of product unsold directly because of the writing.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

Cats3000 — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 10:31:39 GMT

I'm not sure that English is the first language in the US, either. Some stuff I read is garbled garbage.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

songbird — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 10:42:17 GMT

At least it's in English. It could be only in Mandarin. Native: 873 million 2nd: 178 million TOTAL: 1.051 billion speak this. If a bunch of Aliens came to earth to study our language. Mandarin would be the language of Earthlings.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

caroln242 — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 13:07:56 GMT

@Cats3000 wrote:
I'm not sure that English is the first language in the US, either. Some stuff I read is garbled garbage.

Amen to that!

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

Buffalogal47 — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 15:10:44 GMT

@PickyPicky3: I guess it depends on the language. Asian languages like Chinese or Turkish, to name 2, have a completely different sentence structure than Indo-European languages like English so it is very difficult to translate them. I suspect the computer does word-for-word translations so they often make no sense. The old cliche, "loses something in the translation" comes to mind.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

Still Raining — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 16:24:22 GMT

I have seen that too. Just have to work with it.

BF teaches researches and catalogues Chinese. I was floored that she has a lot of problems with ancient script.

Re: English Must Not Be Their First Language

Vivian — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 16:40:23 GMT

As a lifelong student of studying the French language, I long ago learned that direct translations are impossible, and often quite funny. When translating, it's important to turn to those who have direct and exact knowledge of the language.