I wanted to know what fitbit is, but the site redirects me to fitbit.com/de and I closed that site.
How can they be open about data, if they have obviously no clue about open standards, like http accept headers? Worse, there's no way to visit the (official?) fitbit.com site even after that idiotic redirect. I can't access an english version, period. Stupid.
There's a logical flaw in your reasoning "doesn't http accept headers" doesn't imply anything about their understanding of open standards.
While it's perfectly understandable that you might be upset that their site for Germany doesn't offer english language as an option, that's clearly a completely separate issue from how they handle user data.
You're correct. I let my anger about ignoring my explicit preferences, which I expressed in a standard way, lead me to believe that the company doesn't care.
Obviously that's annoyance speaking and speculating based on me being tired with the constant 'Hey, I know better what you want' attitude (Looking at you, Google/Blogger) - I don't even know a single thing about their product (which is why I went to the site in the first place).
Sorry about that. I stand by my point about this sort of redirection being a telltale sign of a flawed web site and lack of respect for user preferences. What else they can or cannot do, I have no clue about and cannot judge.
Given that you're in Germany and they don't have an english version of their Germany website available their two options would be either to send you to the German language website for Germany (which they do) or alternatively send you to the US or UK website which are in english.
I'm not sure it's obvious that sending someone in Germany to the UK/US website (where presumably they'll be unable to buy the product) just because their browser is set to English is the better solution.
While for sites like Blogger language is obviously more important than country, for companies which are country-localized (i.e they treat different countries differently for shipping, taxes, legal, operations, etc.) I would guess that it makes more sense to send you to local country version.
Imagine you were using say a dating site or a takeaway site, you would find it equally frustrating if you were routed away from a local language site to a US specific site just because that's what your language preferences were set to.
b) the region I'd like the product to ship to, if at all
Why is the site different for different countries, ignoring 'translation'? I haven't thought it through, maybe, but I cannot come up with any decent reason for a 'German' site that isn't just the 'US' site in a different language.
In that case, please (dear website) listen to what I'm asking for. If I go to fitbit.com I expect to get the very same thing someone in the US receives. I'd like to talk about the very same site. I don't want someone to redirect me to a localized thing. And certainly not without giving me the opportunity to say 'Yeah, no. That was stupid. I really wanted the original version, silly'.
Same thing: If I go to www.google.com, I want to end up at www.google.com, not www.google.de. If I visit a random post on Blogger, chances are everything content is in English. Except for the 'helpful' Blogger toolbar and whatnot, that are coming up in German, because hey that's where we figured out you're coming from.
Lived in Israel for a year, got a Hebrew toolbar, google.il (and I'd like to know what fitbits would've done there). German vs. English is one thing: I can read both, I just explicitly (url, domain, accept headers) ask for the latter. English vs. Hebrew is another: I cannot read the latter, even if I happen to be - yay for geolocation - in the one state that represents the Hebrew language.
Imagine you were using say a dating site or a takeaway site, you would find it
equally frustrating if you were routed away from a local language site to a
US specific site
Right. Don't send me anywhere if I navigate to example.com, even if I ask for de_DE. Offer a translated version, if you can. Otherwise drop a small (German?) link on your .com, saying 'We noticed you explicitly ask for German content. We got a country specific site right here -> example.de'
A dating site would allow me to register and state my country of origin or interest (which might be Germany, even if I live in Tel Aviv at that time). A takeaway site is really a weird example. www.pizza.de is available in German only for all I can tell and won't redirect me to a random US site because I ask the server to please return en_US or en localized content, _if possible_.
So, for me this whole 'automagic-we-know-it-best' translation/redirection thing is broken by design. It was a constant hassle in the past and just seems to catch on. Which is why I'm pointing it out when I can. I'm sorry for the thread-jacking. Thanks for the exchange so far.
I wanted to know what fitbit is, but the site redirects me to fitbit.com/de and I closed that site.
How can they be open about data, if they have obviously no clue about open standards, like http accept headers? Worse, there's no way to visit the (official?) fitbit.com site even after that idiotic redirect. I can't access an english version, period. Stupid.