When did our world become so small?

I was raised only child in a nice Italian town.  Little did I know, in a few year’s time, I would end up interacting with people from all over the world – and without even leaving my own living room!  With Metaverse Mod Squad, I have teammates in Germany, Brazil, Spain, the United States, Canada, England, etc.  So many languages and so much distance between us, yet… we speak almost daily, have many of the same goals, and help support the same awesome clients and projects.  When did the world become so small?

Whether you use the internet to connect with friends, read news, play games, or simply as a window into places you’ll never see otherwise, you’ve surely noticed that the web is slowly starting to permeate more and more aspects of your daily life.  As this wave of easy-digital access spreads and flows, it provides fresh, unheard of possibilities on a larger market.  Selling something globally online, for example, is a lot different than selling an item in any local, conventional store.  It requires know-how, expertise, and, most of all, the knowledge of foreign languages.

Being a language-loving geek, I have always held high the idea of mastering multiple languages.  When I started learning English and French, back in middle school, we fancied that it would have been cool to be able to converse with the occasional tourist, or to work for one of those companies who have “ties overseas.”  Nowadays, knowing at least one additional language, other than your own mother-tongue (in my opinion) essential. The internet is a nationless entity.  Borders cannot stop the popularity of content online, and what business or site wants to limit its audience to a single nationality, cornered by language?

Take Wikipedia, for example.  If you look up any random subject, you can scroll to see the variety of languages that one article is available in, beyond “english.”  It’s a global website, with many visitors to appeal to and service.  We cannot afford to live in a monolingual dimension anymore, not in this international, fast-paced universe called the internet.

If somebody asked me, “What is the first and most vital step necessary to a career in digital media, or to take advantage of the net’s endless possibilities?” My answer would be simple: learn another language! (This can include coding languages too!)  There is so much possibility for bilingual or trilingual web-users looking for new careers.  The more social the world becomes, the more available content becomes cross-international divides, the bigger the need for those who have mastered multiple languages.  It’s very exciting!

So, if you’re not already running to your nearest book store – or, more appropriately, looking up language guides online – sooner or later, you’re going to be missing out!

Internet ti aspetta! (“Internet is waiting for you” in Italian.)

Lara Greco
Bilingual Moderator