Yes, been waiting to get a Silicon Valley-style allusion to MVP (Minimum Viable Product) into a blog post for ages. And now, thanks to Java and Android guru and i18n veteran John O’Conner (@joconner), here it is:

The Absolute Minimum You Need to Know About Internationalization

A simple, straightforward and understandable list of the key things that developers, designers and product folks need to know to make a product ready for successful global launch. What a contrast to those hectoring tl;dr i18n tomes we’ve had to deal with at times (and we wonder why nobody heeds the advice?)

We’ve come a long way since this example of major #i18nfail I encountered in 1996 (a real case with content changed to protect the starry-eyed innocents of the day):

But not far enough.

Let’s see more posts like John’s to remind us about what’s important and to make it less scary for emerging technologies and startups to understand and integrate internationalization requirements into their processes.