Microsoft itself provides a prime example for this: Knowledge-Base articles are often poorly translated and you really want to link to the english version if there is no translation available. Implicit content switches are really bad for the user experience.
Also, language versions of big websites often differ hierarchically as well, with the differences in hierarchy being directly bound to the language. On Wikipedia, the problem is so big that it is actually moved to the domain (the highest level of the hierarchy).
(should be): yes. It should be. In the ideal world of people that constructed RFCs. Sadly, there is a real world out there.
In the end, with my users hat on: I don't care. I want to send a link and I assume that my peer sees exactly what I see. I don't want to care about the details of your technical implementation of your website and whether it is structurally sound in the grand scheme of the interwebs. I also don't want to say "and switch to..." every time I send a link.
Also, language versions of big websites often differ hierarchically as well, with the differences in hierarchy being directly bound to the language. On Wikipedia, the problem is so big that it is actually moved to the domain (the highest level of the hierarchy).
(should be): yes. It should be. In the ideal world of people that constructed RFCs. Sadly, there is a real world out there.
In the end, with my users hat on: I don't care. I want to send a link and I assume that my peer sees exactly what I see. I don't want to care about the details of your technical implementation of your website and whether it is structurally sound in the grand scheme of the interwebs. I also don't want to say "and switch to..." every time I send a link.