The continent of Asia spans from Yemen to Indonesia to Siberia. It covers less than a third of the world’s landmass, but hosts 60% of its population. Asia is wide subject matter for any issue, particularly in a time when the Middle East is in such a state of flux, and partially for that reason this issue primarily covers East Asia. Interestingly or not, most people still tend to think of East Asia when Asia gets referenced — websites such as Stuff Asian People Like continue to promulgate this. For better, for worse, or just for simplicity’s sake, in the everyday vernacular, India, Afghanistan and Russia do not spring to mind when the Asian continent is invoked.

In our focus, then, Frank Lin and Angelika Zerfaß introduce software localization for China and Japan. Rebecca Ray continues with a look at social media in Asia, and Terena Bell and Maureen McCarthy have some suggestions for Japanese in-country review. Xiaochun Zhang covers virtual assets and localization for games in China, and Bob Myers rounds things out with details on the evolution of Asian writing systems — Japanese, Chinese and Korean.

In our regular columns, Lori Thicke provides an interview with John Papaioannou of Bentley Systems, Kate Edwards writes about trade-offs and John Freivalds explains waiting lines around the world.

Jacques Barreau of Warner Bros. has additional insights on the casting process for dubbing, and Jaime Mateos discusses XLIFF positioning. Deborah Schaffer reviews Virtual Words by Jonathon Keats, and Ultan Ó Broin ends with a Takeaway on user experience.

Our cover for this issue was provided by a reader, and we’d like to take the opportunity to invite anyone with photos featuring poignant examples of multilingual text or multiculturalism to submit them for publication. We’re always looking for good cover shots, and we’ll be happy to give you graphics guidelines and further information if you send us an e-mail. On that note, here’s another photo, submitted by Marsha Lutz of Our World Focus, taken in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.