World''s first email with address in Chinese characters

For the first time an email system allowing users to address recipients with Chinese characters or a combination of characters and letters has been launched enabling Chinese and non-Chinese speakers to communicate with automated translation tools that translate from Chinese to English and vice-versa.

This enables any user outside of China to email in Chinese from computers that cannot switch from alphabet to characters for lack of a Chinese IME or operating system.

Introduced by Chinglish.com, the application works between all Chinglish account holders. To enable users to continue receiving emails from other email providers, Chinglish has introduced bilingual account management. Users can receive emails addressed to name_written_in_Chinese_characters@chinglish.com from any Chinglish account. At the same time the user can keep receiving emails addressed to name_written_in_Roman_letters@chinglish.com sent from third party email providers.

Chinglish email innovation: unparalleled opportunities
Email being the number one application on internet, this offers unprecedented opportunities for China''s exploding number of netizens, the 40 million foreigners studying Chinese, and cross-cultural communication in general. Marius van Bergen, Chinglish CEO, says, "Most non-Chinese businessmen in China know from experience how important it is to have a Chinese name. That is why they have business cards with their Chinese name on the reverse side. To them, Chinglish email offers unparalleled opportunities in the trust-building process and in showing commitment to China and its culture."

The first email message from China was sent in 1986 but it took another decade for internet to become available to the Chinese public. Internet being a Western invention, email protocol was originally developed for the Roman alphabet. A person in China called xiaowang in pinyin transcription could not register xiaowang_written_in_Chinese_characters@email provider but had to use xiaowang_written_in_Roman_letters@email provider instead. Until today, China''s 150 million internet users could not use their own name in their own language to email with.