A recent study of the most viewed Wikipedia articles of 2012 reveals the humorous, charming, and sometimes ponderous topics of great interest in different parts of the world. The French, it turns out, want to know about ornamental holly, while the Germans want to know what a cul-de-sac is, and the Vietnamese are reading up on sex positions.
Unfortunately, it’s hard to explore these differences using the study itself, because it was published in a combination of 35 languages.
Here, I’ve translated the top hits for each version of Wikipedia. I’ve included the top two, because in a lot of cases the most read article is either the language’s mother country (which isn’t all that interesting) or something like “Facebook,” which likely picked up some accidental traffic from people trying to find the social media site itself.
Arabic
- مصر — Egypt (1,290,846 page views)
- محمد علي باشا — Muhammad Ali of Egypt, considered the founder of modern Egypt (1,102,922)
Bulgarian
- България — Bulgaria (499,529)
- Васил Левски — Vasil Levsky, a Bulgarian revolutionary who helped liberate Bulgaria from Ottoman rule in the 19th century (277,495)
Catalan
- Mario Conde — former president of Banesto bank who was imprisoned for misappropriating $4.2 million in bank funds and falsifying documents to cover it up (198,420)
- Catalunya — Catalonia (149,397)
Chinese
- 百度 — Baidu, a large web-services company in China that includes a popular search engine (4,907,569)
- Favicon — a small icon representing a website (for instance, you might see a black “Q” in your browser tab right now; that’s our favicon) (3,956,858)
Croatian
- Zakon o sprječavanju internetskog piratstva — The Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA. A controversial US bill proposing to “expand the ability of U.S. law enforcement to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property” (446,557)
- Hrvatska — Croatia (404,725)
Czech
- Seznam historických výročí — A list of historical anniversaries (680,704)
- Wiki — a website that allows users to edit the content, such as Wikipedia (631,260)
Danish
Dutch
- Hua Shan — Mount Hua, one of China’s five sacred mountains, said to have one of the most dangerous hiking trails in the world (12,719,284)
- Nederland — The Netherlands (1,169,987)
English
- Facebook (32,647,942 views)
- Wiki — a website that allows users to edit the content, such as Wikipedia(29,613,759)
Estonian
- Eesti — Estonia (215,195)
- Euroopa Liit — European Union (40,645)
Finnish
- Suomi — Finland (633,367)
- Wiki — a website that allows users to edit the content, such as Wikipedia (371,022)
French
- Houx crénelé — Box-leaved holly, an ornamental plant native to Japan (4,464,618)
- France (4,017,089)
German
- Sackgasse — Cul-de-sac (10,206,548)
- Deutschland — Germany (6,445,565)
Greek
- Ελλάδα — Greece (443,111)
- Χρυσή Αυγή (πολιτικό κόμμα) — Golden Dawn, a Greek political party that supports an authoritarian state and has been accused of being a Neo-Nazi organization (428,045)
Hebrew
- ישראל — Israel (473,677)
- ארצות הברית — The United States (298,558)
Hungarian
- Magyar névnapok betűrendben — a list of Hungarian first names (601,134)
- 2012-es labdarúgó-Európa-bajnokság — The 2012 UEFA European Football Championship (546,857)
Indonesian
Italian
- Grey’s Anatomy — an American television drama set in a hospital (2,592,423)
- Italia — Italy (2,519,023)
Japanese
- AV女優一覧 — a list of adult video actresses (18,569,543)
- AKB48 — a Japanese pop music girl group (7,133,542)
Korean
- 네이버 — Naver, a popular search engine in South Korea (609,622)
- 거의 모든 점에서 — Almost everywhere, a mathematical property that is part of measure theory (which I won’t butcher here) (473,400)
Lithuanian
- Lietuva — Lithuania (273,436)
- Matavimo vienetas — Units of measurement (e.g. pounds, meters, or kilowatts) (140,550)
Norwegian
Persian
Polish
- Polska — Poland (2,985,112)
- Zamek swobodny — Open bolt, a particular design for transferring bullets from the magazine to the chamber in automatic and semi-automatic firearms (1,949,944)
Portuguese
- Brasil — Brazil (3,664,094)
- Luiz Gonzaga — A famous Brazilian folksinger (2,218,273)
Romanian
- România — Romania (615,033)
- Mihai Eminescu — A famous Romanian poet (557,891)
Russian
Slovak
- Majstrovstvá sveta v ľadovom hokeji 2012 — 2012 IIHF World Ice Hockey Championship (446,751)
- Slovensko — Slovakia (346,566)
Slovene
- Slovenija — Slovenia (174,542)
- France Prešeren — A famous Slovenian poet (77,896)
Spanish
- Facebook (11,217,715)
- Arroba (símbolo) — The at sign, or apetail. (This symbol: @) (7,376,763)
Swedish
- Sverige — Sweden (947,276)
- Loreen — A Swedish pop singer who won the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest (603,992)
Thai
- สมาคมประชาชาติแห่งเอเชียตะวันออกเฉียงใต้ — The Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN (1,199,945)
- เศรษฐกิจพอเพียง — Sufficiency Economy, an economic model derived from the sayings of King Bhumibol Adulyadej (1,102,110)
Turkish
- Mustafa Kemal Atatürk — The founder and first president of modern Turkey (2,185,387)
- Go — a strategy-based board game originating in China (1,750,564)
Ukrainian
- Україна — Ukraine (523,726)
- Шевченко Тарас Григорович — a famous Ukrainian poet (473,381)
Vietnamese
- Danh sách tư thế quan hệ tình dục — A post about sexual positions (2,018,973)
- Facebook (1,135,046)