Dear Peter,
It's good to see that the issue of internationalization is increasingly popping up in the IA discussions.
However, I have some comments about the way it is percieved.

Language

Your article touches on the cultural AND the language issue. You quote a dane and a dutchman - both countries where you'll not expect the english language to be a barrier for an information architect. The issue of internationalization of Information Architecture as a discipline and a profession is not the same in all parts of the world. In some countries they need a translation of articles and websites - in other countries they don't.

Culture

What is really interesting in my opinion is the other aspect - that of culture. I don't see any reason to "fear" the americanization of the web. First of all the web is already americanized, and we all understand this - and act accordingly (well most of us). It is not a fundamental flaw of a system to have users adapt - even though some usability proponents seem to think so.

It is not always - in my opinion - a good idea to develop, launch and maintain - more than one website - just to cover your a.. and not attract critizism from people who have strong feelings against "US cultural imperialism". As long as your organization is sure that it can maintain more than one site, and that it will pay off - it is a good idea. But I strongly suggest that the organization do the homework and research the matter thoroughly before embarking on such an adventure. You cannot just take down a localized site, when it is up and running.

Global media

I believe that the web is - and should be - a global web. That does not mean that all should be in the same language. But it does mean that ultimately standardized shopping cart interaction design, standardized navigational design, standardized search engine design and other standards of search, find, and interact - should and will develop and spread throughout the web. Naturally there will be local habits here and there, and also there will be differences that not all of us will understand.

If you look at books - most western books are structured the same way, pagination, headlines, chapters, parts, index etc.. If you look at the cinema it is the same - mostly the same structure, the same angles of shots, the same meaning of close ups, of cutting, of sounds, music etc. Also in movies there are the rolling texts in the beginning and at the end - and the way producers, stars etc are presented is generally the same.
Conventions do develop - evolve - and spread.
But most of us in the western hemisphere do not understand the finer points of a Bollywood sing and dance movie. It is here that we find the cultural differences.
The differences you see between danish, french and english movies are small in comparison. The differences between European and US movies are small. What some people tend to confuse it with, is the difference between "cinema" and "movies" - between the artsy and the commercial. The commercial European movies use all the same effects and the same dramaturgical structure as the Hollywood movies - even if the language is different.
You could say the same of both tv and computer games. They are international media in that way, and they should be so. No need to invent differences which are not significant.

The business issue

My point is that the differences between European web development and US web development may well be a matter of the business and not so much a matter of cultural differences. And so it should be.
When US Information Architects discuss IA they almost invariably refer to projects with accounts so large that most European IAs have little or no experience at all with that kind of business. In a small country budgets seem to be many times smaller than in the US - because the user base is so much smaller. This is a real difference with real impact on the projects. But this kind of difference is not directly a matter of country, language or culture. It is a matter of business. There are small projects in the US too and these projects with small budgets suffer the samme difficulties - and have the same shortcomings when it comes to IA - as do the European projects.

So all in all, I think that it could prove interesting to learn about the web projects of other cultures - like the Japanese, Peruvian or Iranian.

I don't see any real value however, in trying to differentiate between different nationalities like danish, dutch, norwegian, polish, german, french, italian etc - as the users are all perfectly capable of overcoming the small difficulties which come from cultural differences.

What I do see however, is an almost allergic overreaction on the part of the US IAs - in their effort to not step on any "NON-US toes", and not come forward as the always inconsiderate, badly mannered US bully.
And I also see too much over-sensitivity on the part of some European IAs - who would use any excuse to lash out at the US, and insist that there are so many differences and that the US IAs should not dominate.
Well - last time I counted there were far more US Information Architects, and far more US books on IA, and I still believe this to be the case.

Even if European internet business is catching up, it is still European. It means that we could say that if there are any European ways of doing things, that are different from the way the US does things - it could be interesting. But that is not what is being discussed. What is being discussed is language, and the silent asumption that language also means culture and perhaps country.

My comment is running way too long. So I'll stop here. I may write on this on my website.