I often get answers in non-english languages. I don't understand why they aren't forcing the language that the user is browsing with unless otherwise specified.

I think they’re probably just passing some context on the user (region) and instructing it to use that language. I assume many queries you cannot trace to the user language because they’re just some generic search terms (‘taj mahal’,’Donald Trump China’ or whatever) so they probably instruct the model to answer in a specific language and they overdo it a bit

But my browser is sending my language.

Your browser's language doesn't necessarily map to what you'll want responses to be in. A lot of people speak different languages.

Why wouldn't those people set the browser to the languages they speak?

Because the translation of that specific software might be superior in e.g US English?

So this hypothetical user is setting a different language and then complaining that they're getting that language?

It's not that complex. Say your OS or system setting is US English and you're downloading say, an app in Spanish that was developed with that in mind, you'd want that, wouldn't you?

It's not that complex. If I don't speak Spanish, I don't want it, no. If I do, then I'll go to my browser settings, and set my preferred language to Spanish.

But that'll translate the entire browser to Spanish, which you may* not want. All due respect, but you don't seem to be in touch with reality on this one.

Just because you speak a language, doesn't necessarily mean it's your preference all over the place. Or let's say you're Dutch and you live in the US. Your OS is in English, and imagine if telegraaf.nl auto-switched to English.

  (**) The web and apps are full of less than ideal translations. And AI has actually worsened it.

Well, I'm Greek and live in Greece, and el-GR/en-US has served me fine for decades.

Bad assumption. If I punch in a sentence in say German or Portuguese expecting a translation, what the AI does is go on a tirade in German or Portuguese about the sentence I wrote. I have to explicitly say “translate to English” even though my locale settings and geolocation would strongly indicate that’s what I wanted implicitly.

When I was googling something about oil refining equipment it started answering in Arabic, obviously.

For me, it's always in the language I'm asking in, though my Google account language is set to English.