: Re: Should one blog in a few languages? Greetings. I've been blogging for a while now and I do it in Russian. But, some of my English-speaking... AHEM "Internet-friends" are unable to read my personal

@Bryan361

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I’ve blogged in English and Spanish in the past and I can give you some experiences I collected along the way:

Blogging on different languages is time consuming. Expect to add an additional 2 hours to your blog post.
Do not write in Russian and then translate to English. Write in English and then translate to Russian. That way you make sure you have enough knowledge to write the post on all languages and that you actually do. If you do it the opposite way you’ll end up with lots of post not getting translated.
Choose a platform that supports multi language in posts. I’ve used with success both Wordpress and Drupal. Both have the ability to chose the language for the post as a drop down flag and automatically detect the language based on browser configuration.
Chose a platform that makes translating easy. It should allow you to see current translation state of all your posts and allow you to refer to the original test when you are translating it.

Finally, posting in English is always a boost in readership reach not only limited to your Facebook friends. You’ll get more readers (assuming quality content not centred around local topics) coming from google. English is the de facto language of the internet. You should expect a huge extra reach by posting in English as compared to, for example, translating to Spanish or German. The reason comes from the fact that English is either the main language or a second language for almost everybody.

In addition,blogging in English (not translating to English but actually blogging IN that language) is an excellent way of learning the language. In time it will force you to think in English and use English expressions, it will help you understand where your limitations are and, by virtue of wanting to use a particular expression, it will develop your vocabulary and understanding of the language. Specially, it will develop the complexity of the phrases you’re able to use as opposed to your fluency (which is improved better by consuming spoken material like radio or movies).

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