Interesting graph. One thing I noticed that might make the graph easier to read: there are official post office abbreviations for states. OK for Oklahoma, AK for Alaska, ME for Maine, etc. Most people looking for their state will recognize the two-letter abbreviations easier.
In my experience, many people outside of the states can only really name a few specific states. Often it’s New York, California, Hawaii, Texas, Florida, and/or Alaska.
I’d wager quite a bit of money that less than 50% of people outside of the US would be able to identify which name in the following list is not one of the 50 states: Navajo, Idaho, Utah, and Montana.
I mean if you want to argue anecdotal evidence with anecdotal evidence, then you’d have to match my knowing all 50 states alphabetically. You’d also have to account for my friend in Norway who, when asked what states they could name (specifically in regard to this thread, but wasn’t originally in reference to your reply), gave me 12 names. 10 of them were US states (5 of them were in my list of 6 commonly named states) and the other 2 were US cities. That being said I will also state that they did get my question right despite my expectations.
But more broadly, I’m not saying that there aren’t people in places outside of the US who know many/all of the states or who know much more about the US than myself/most US residents. I am saying that in my personal experience talking with friends I’ve made over the Internet who do not live in the US, those friends generally know only a few states and the 6 I’ve listed are by and large the most common ones I’ve seen them list.
This American obsession with those awful abbreviations is exhausting. Foreigners should not have to remember if AL is Alabama or Alaska or MI is Mississippi or Michigan, especially when lacking any context clue as to which one it is. “ME” for Maine is straight up evil. Can you name the TLD of Peru of the top of your head?
There are places where abbreviations make sense: where there will be extreme repetition (TLDs, letters) or where space and readability are under tight constraint (license plates, next to the points counter on a football broadcast). An already extremely sparse infographic with no hard layout restriction is decidedly not either of those things and should therefore just use the full goddamn name instead of trying to signal “hey look this is made by an American for an American, fuck everyone else”.
Interesting graph. One thing I noticed that might make the graph easier to read: there are official post office abbreviations for states. OK for Oklahoma, AK for Alaska, ME for Maine, etc. Most people looking for their state will recognize the two-letter abbreviations easier.
People not from the US will prefer names, not some (for most of the world) meaningless abbreviations.
In my experience, many people outside of the states can only really name a few specific states. Often it’s New York, California, Hawaii, Texas, Florida, and/or Alaska.
I’d wager quite a bit of money that less than 50% of people outside of the US would be able to identify which name in the following list is not one of the 50 states: Navajo, Idaho, Utah, and Montana.
I’d wager quite a bit of money that I (EU) can name as many as the average US banana republic dweller.
I mean if you want to argue anecdotal evidence with anecdotal evidence, then you’d have to match my knowing all 50 states alphabetically. You’d also have to account for my friend in Norway who, when asked what states they could name (specifically in regard to this thread, but wasn’t originally in reference to your reply), gave me 12 names. 10 of them were US states (5 of them were in my list of 6 commonly named states) and the other 2 were US cities. That being said I will also state that they did get my question right despite my expectations.
But more broadly, I’m not saying that there aren’t people in places outside of the US who know many/all of the states or who know much more about the US than myself/most US residents. I am saying that in my personal experience talking with friends I’ve made over the Internet who do not live in the US, those friends generally know only a few states and the 6 I’ve listed are by and large the most common ones I’ve seen them list.
This American obsession with those awful abbreviations is exhausting. Foreigners should not have to remember if AL is Alabama or Alaska or MI is Mississippi or Michigan, especially when lacking any context clue as to which one it is. “ME” for Maine is straight up evil. Can you name the TLD of Peru of the top of your head?
There are places where abbreviations make sense: where there will be extreme repetition (TLDs, letters) or where space and readability are under tight constraint (license plates, next to the points counter on a football broadcast). An already extremely sparse infographic with no hard layout restriction is decidedly not either of those things and should therefore just use the full goddamn name instead of trying to signal “hey look this is made by an American for an American, fuck everyone else”.