How do you pronounce Taobao?

[Chi]

Yup tow-bow with the "ow" as in c"ow".
Reading it as dao is something completely American when non-speakers have problems pronouncing the words correctly.  Chinese may have different accents, but we pronounce our words pretty much the same way. Dao and Tao mean very different things and refer to very different Chinese characters.
Taobao means (at least the way I direct translate it) mischievious baby, but in a cute and endearing way. Bao can also mean precious or refer to a treasure, so there's a bit of  a word play going on I guess.

Is that why, when Google translates it, it keeps asking me to "Search for baby"?

Yes.
Also when you try to translate pages it says "Favorite Baby" "Baby details" "Baby Category" "View all Baby" "View the members of the baby's view" and then the search bar at the top says "Looking for what baby?"

[saply]

Yup tow-bow with the "ow" as in c"ow".
Reading it as dao is something completely American when non-speakers have problems pronouncing the words correctly.  Chinese may have different accents, but we pronounce our words pretty much the same way. Dao and Tao mean very different things and refer to very different Chinese characters.
Taobao means (at least the way I direct translate it) mischievious baby, but in a cute and endearing way. Bao can also mean precious or refer to a treasure, so there's a bit of  a word play going on I guess.

Is that why, when Google translates it, it keeps asking me to "Search for baby"?

Yes.
Also when you try to translate pages it says "Favorite Baby" "Baby details" "Baby Category" "View all Baby" "View the members of the baby's view" and then the search bar at the top says "Looking for what baby?"

I wonder if Angelina Jolie knows about this site?

[rtattles]

Yup tow-bow with the "ow" as in c"ow".
Reading it as dao is something completely American when non-speakers have problems pronouncing the words correctly.  Chinese may have different accents, but we pronounce our words pretty much the same way. Dao and Tao mean very different things and refer to very different Chinese characters.
Taobao means (at least the way I direct translate it) mischievious baby, but in a cute and endearing way. Bao can also mean precious or refer to a treasure, so there's a bit of  a word play going on I guess.

Is that why, when Google translates it, it keeps asking me to "Search for baby"?

Yes.
Also when you try to translate pages it says "Favorite Baby" "Baby details" "Baby Category" "View all Baby" "View the members of the baby's view" and then the search bar at the top says "Looking for what baby?"

I wonder if Angelina Jolie knows about this site?

So now she not only wants another baby, but at factory prices?

[toralei]

Well, the chinese letters for it are "淘宝" (táo bǎo) which would be tau bau or something like that. It rhymes with "ow".
But I'm not really sure, since I'm pronouncing it in chinese lol

Yes, that's correct 

[apanda0622]

Tow-Bow
Okay!  Thanks everyone!

[Ginger]

lol!! This thread was SO confusing to me. I kept thinking of a ribbon bow every time I read "bow".
I think I got it now.
Tow-Bow rhymes with ow as in ouch.

[Vintergatan]

What an awesome topic! can some of you elaborate a bit on how T in Tao is supposed to sound, like give a word with a similar sound (not necessarily in english, any indo-european language + japanese would help )

[babystarz]

What an awesome topic! can some of you elaborate a bit on how T in Tao is supposed to sound, like give a word with a similar sound (not necessarily in english, any indo-european language + japanese would help )

I believe it's "ts", like if you try to say t and s as the same time, as it's really one sound. I don't actually speak a language that uses this sound (at least, no words are coming to mind), but my boyfriend takes Mandarin so he's explained this sound to me before.

I'm sure it depends on what region of China someone is from too, because even two people who are ostensibly speaking (non-academic) Mandarin can have such differing accents that they find it difficult to understand each other. There are many regional dialects and languages as well

[Ringlets]

yep thats true about the different dialects and accents. the tone you say it in can make a difference to the meaning as well . I dont know any Mandarin though. I know some Cantonese, which uses the traditional chinese characters but the language and  tones are different to Mandarin   
 So ok. Tow -bow.      Thankies for clearing that up

[PinkRosedust]

How now brown cow taobao. That's how I've been saying it. =D

[Vintergatan]

Thanks guys, i at least have an idea now ^^

[HavACrumpet452]

I'm learning Cantonese right now but I can't say I would know because I'm only learning verbal from the Pimsleur program.  I'm not even supposed to look up how words look written down until I learn to speak like the native speaker. It's hard.

[Malancaiwen]

I have no idea how it should prononced in cantonese but in standard mandarin it's definitely the same sound as in "cow"

Someone mentionned about Tsingtao beer, don't let this fool you as the correct pinyin (english caracters for chinese) would be "qing dao" so of couse, the beer and taobao should not sound the same.

the t and b sound in taobao are standard.

Also, in 淘宝 (taobao), 宝 (bao) means treasure and 淘 (tao) means looking for, stumble upon, littleraly meaning "looking for treasures"

Chinese is a very nice language to learn! Takes time but it's worth it :p everything has a reason, every little stroke carries different meaning.