Just for fun: Retail demo user names in Windows 10

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  aidtopia October 19, 2020 0

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  At one software company I worked, there was a release form where you could grant the company the right to use your name fictitiously in documentation and marketing stuff. Lots of people signed the releases because, back then, it was still fun to see your name in print. Sometimes your name would be turned into a business name, like R. Chen Translation Services.

  I have a couple friends who write scripts for television, including...

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  At one software company I worked, there was a release form where you could grant the company the right to use your name fictitiously in documentation and marketing stuff. Lots of people signed the releases because, back then, it was still fun to see your name in print. Sometimes your name would be turned into a business name, like R. Chen Translation Services.

  I have a couple friends who write scripts for television, including sitcoms. Whether they were naming an actual on-screen character or just a passing reference to somebody’s cousin, the name was run by the studio legal department for “clearance.” They used several criteria, including how common the name is.
  (Back in the 90s was still largely determined by looking in several metropolitan phone books.) If only a few people have that name, then there’s increased risk somebody with that name might try to sue for defamation (despite all the disclaimers about the work being fiction). If lots of people shared the name, then it would probably clear. The writers would often tease each other by planting their colleagues’ names in jokes. Lucky for my friends, their names didn’t clear.

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  Henke37 October 13, 2020 0

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  I wonder if there is any correlation with how complete the localization is and if there is a custom demo user name. Some are full localizations, while others have a base language they fall back to.

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    Jonathan Barner October 14, 2020 0

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    That may explain the prevalence of “Owen May”, although I’d expect fallback to en-us, not en-gb. It’s certainly not a typical Hebrew name.

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      Mystery Man October 15, 2020 0

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      For most of the world, falling back to en-US is inconventient. Americans use the Imperial system, write their dates in the month-first style, use the U.S. Letter paper, don't use the negative sign in currency. Most of the world would rather use metric, day-first dates, A4 papers, and the negative sign for currency. Besides, most of the world teaches en-GB in school as "International English".

      Also, what I said is one of the reasons for the...

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      For most of the world, falling back to en-US is inconventient. Americans use the Imperial system, write their dates in the month-first style, use the U.S. Letter paper, don’t use the negative sign in currency. Most of the world would rather use metric, day-first dates, A4 papers, and the negative sign for currency. Besides, most of the world teaches en-GB in school as “International English”.

      Also, what I said is one of the reasons for the unpopularity of Microsoft Store apps here. They don’t stick to the locale. (While we’re at it, they don’t stick to any principle.) At least, the Weather app is nice enough to ask whether I prefer Celcius over Farenheit.

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  Waleri Todorov October 13, 2020 0

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  Who is Owen May? 🙂
  I mean, it seems some languages have no “localized” names and I’m curious why…

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    cheong00 October 14, 2020 0

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    > I mean, it seems some languages have no “localized” names and I’m curious why

    It’s because you only have that much languages available for RetailDemo language packs.

    https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/customize/desktop/retail-demo-experience#add-retail-demo-mode-including-language-packs-to-your-images

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    Erik Fjeldstrom October 13, 2020 0

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    Maybe he’s related to James May, but enjoys computers instead of cars.

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  Mystery Man October 13, 2020 0

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  All of the names seem to be male, although I couldn’t be sure about the Japanese. I mean Sho Kobayashi? I got nothin’.

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  紅樓鍮 October 13, 2020 1

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  If I were to give a Chinese name to someone, I wouldn’t call them 宋冬. It sounds too much like 送终.

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  紅樓鍮 October 13, 2020 0

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  Is the “English name” column supposed to be “Language name”?

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    Andreas Rejbrand October 13, 2020 0

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    It’s the English name of the locale. For instance, the English name of “de-de” is “German” (while the Swedish name would be “Tyska” and the German name “Deutsch”).