Heartlander wrote: Hell, getting someone that can read/write good English is a challenge. (You'd think by now they could produce decent product use instructions for basic mass produced things like electronic watches, universal remotes, etc. but NO).
Because despite our arrogance as English consumers, it makes 0 difference to them as they don't market 'to us'.. they market to other Chinese ODM's, who can read their product specs and documentation just fine .
I've worked with chinese fabs - and dealt with this before.
There is - despite our beliefs otherwise - next to NO Business Case to produce english documentation.
Take for example say the AllWinner A10/A20 - the chip found in 1000's of those Chinese Android Tablets.
English Speakers come to them with the argument 'But if you had decent english documentation, we could sell 100,000 of these units!'.
To which the Chinese ODM (Original Design Manufacturer) responds - "Who cares - I sold 100,000 just on Monday to Shenzen.. and another order for 200,000 is on the way for Wednesday"...
Anyway - my point is - despite "us" 'needing' English - The provision of 'quality english documentation' does *nothing* for their Unit Sales - so thus, like it would be in an English Business - Not bothered with as there is no value proposition in doing so! They can sell 10,000,000 units domestically, and *maybe* 200,000 of each product Internationally...
Learn to read Chinese or drive Machine Translators - because as the Chinese Middle-Class grows, the Chinese Tech Giants will care even less and less about the pesky 'English' speakers... Its *us* that needs to learn to deal with them, not the other way around...
And I don't like having to learn new languages either.. but right now, we need to accept - certainly within the Technology Industry - that English Speakers are fast becoming irrelevant despite our belief that the tech world needs to bow down to the teeny tiny infinitesimal market that we represent...
TL;DR - You will never get 'decent' english documentation and what we get now will further diminish, because we represent right now about 20% of chinese tech giants markets, and that figure is diminishing....
Its the equivalent of someone trying to argue if Texas Instruments produced documentation in Farsi they'd sell enough units to justify the expense/time/effort...