2/27/2014

Unreasonable

This happens on a more or less regular basis:
I applied to a job posted on various different translator sites. Partial job description:
"We’re now looking for Japanese to English translators to work in a project about factory automation. The volume is about 250K chars. .. To know more about the subject, please refer to the sample text below."
Requirements from the poster included to work ONLY during the daytime, approximately 6 hours. I wrote, I can do that and gave them my usual rate.

Two days later, I get the following message (partial):
"This project contains 3 parts—Factory Automation, Factory Supplies and Electronics—and has 3,000,000 chars. The first part, Factory Automation, has technical terms stored in TM. You can also refer to the English websites we provide. So it should be quite simple to translate this part. For Factory Supplies and Electronics, there are Japanese websites for you to check the context. We need to deliver 60K chars to our client everyday. Therefore, you’re free to take as many chars as you like (max. 60K) daily.
In view of this, could you possibly lower your rate to at least USD$ 0.04 per Japanese char? The other candidates have a more competitive rate as USD$0.03 per char."

Well, just for the fun of it, I replied as follows:
Good evening from Japan
And thank you for your message, but I was already wondering when this would happen.
This = "lower your rate".
On 2/24 you wrote in your mail: "However, we will pay you according to your rate, if the translation is approved." (HAS it been "approved"?)
which came as a pleasant surprise to me. Now, things turn out the "usual" way.
Believe me, I have seen / experienced this kind of work before and therefore speak from (30 years of) experience!

Usual = unreasonable requests for unreasonably low rates.
I take the liberty of assuming, that this is what the (Japanese?) client requires, so that you are not guilty of anything.
Maybe people can survive in China or Taiwan working for 0.03 USD/char., but that is NOT realistic here in Japan.
"So it should be quite simple to translate this part. ... there are Japanese websites for you to check the context."
THAT is precisely what makes this work VERY labor intensive.
* no context to refer to
* highly technical terms (I VERY much doubt that terms like "高周波焼入れ / 浸炭焼き" are FA related!) that needs to be checked
* "websites to check ..." means, you have to search through many pages of online material = requires time! (unless they have well organized glossaries -> unlikely)
 Let's take for example "高周波焼入" -> if you KNOW the translation already -> just the time for entering it into the software;
if you need to look up something / everything or even check "reference" material -> let's assume quick, smooth work to do all that in TWO minutes.
Then it would take 24 seconds per character (this number may of course vary widely).
Then: 24 x 60,000=1,440,000 seconds= 400 hours of work daily.
no eating, sleeping, telephone calls, toilet breaks ... nothing.
Since you require translators who work ONLY during the daytime, let's say 8 hours without once removing their fingers from the keyboard = 50 translators.
(the sample you gave me as a trial contained practically 0 repetitions -> the use of CAT tools is unlikely to help!)
To make it happen in reality, you would need more.
Getting THAT many translators, who all work for peanuts can happen only in China or India.

Naturally, the quality (for reasons I outlined before) cannot be quaranteed or even maintained among that many translators.
The client could put the whole thing through Google translate and get the same result: incomprehensible mumble jumble.
So, if the client INSISTS on a cheap product, cheap Chinese quality is what it will get.

I may not be the best in the field, BUT as a professional translator I prefer to TAKE PRIDE in my work.
As such, I can not live with the idea that it is completely irrelevant, whether my translation is correct or not,
as long as I put ANYTHING into the empty cells of the Excel sheet.

If your "other candidates" have no problem with working for 0.03 USD and no doubts about the nature of this work ... fine.
Please rely on those gentlepersons.
Under the given conditions I prefer not volunteer for more material than I could do comfortably during an afteroon tea break.

Thank you.
/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
The chief virtue that language can have is clearness,
and nothing detracts from it so much as the use of unfamiliar words.
Hippocrates
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2/26/2014

Slantwise

There was a job offer on Proz.com and in the post there was a little sample text (partially):
"Be sure to use the projector properly in the specified position. The projector can project images upwards, downwards or slantwise in the direction vertical to a horizontal surface. When slantwise installing the projector downwards, make sure its bottom upturned."

Please correct me, if I am saying something stupid, but as far as I am capable to understand, an installation "vertical to a horizontal surface" can by definition not be "slantwise".
And, I tried hard, but cannot picture how the position of the machine is supposed to look like in: slantwise installing the projector downwards, make sure its bottom upturned."

Probably I simply lack imagination ...

2/20/2014

Classic fraud

Today I got following message:
"AS A TEST FOR QUALIFYING CANDIDATE, PLEASE TRANSLATE THE ATTACHED FILE AND SEND IT BACK TO ME.
REGARDS
ARIJEET"

from mail address: transactmaster@gmail.com
(free mail ... naturally ...)

and I sent that person the following answer:
The classic scheme of fraud!!!
YOU do not identify yourself, don't give any contact details, do not specify anything regarding the "potential" work, ...
BUT
want to have translation work done for free.

I am sure you do not mind, when I warn my fellow translators.
Thomas Blasejewicz

And that is precisely what I am doing here.
Unless that person provides some credible identification, PLEASE be careful!
The chances of an attempt at fraud are 180%

Response from friendly Mr. Arijeet:
Hello Thomas,

I am sure, you do not receive any job from your clients. If you speak to a client so rude in first time conversations, how can one think of getting a job done by you. And stop using defamatory languages towards your clients. And samples are needed to examine the quality of the translation by the translator and not for your cheap and f..king comments.

If you had any guts there in your a.s , then you should had done a passage from the sample file rather than translating the whole file. Then also I might have examined your quality.

Also try to speak to your clients softly for the first time rather than accusing them rudely.

Your well wisher
Arijeet

to which I took the liberty of answering (since I had the time today ...):
Thank you for your wise words.
Aparently you still are not inclined to identify yourself.
A net search I made just for the fun of it, shows no such company as "transactmaster"  (derived from your email address).
And you send me your stuff from a free mail address. How trustworthy!

Since you are not a client of mine and I am not an employee of yours ... there is nothing to worry.
You may rest assured that my correspondence with PROPER BUSINESS entities is polite and professional.
And so is the correspondence from such PROPER BUSINESS entities.

Samples? Since you found my name and other contact information somewhere (you sent your mail to my website account!), you DO HAVE access to over 20 pages worth of "samples" I made publicly available right there.
Having a look was too troublesome?

I am sure, you will find better qualified personnel that does not complain without any trouble at all.

Thomas Blasejewicz
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2/09/2014

明日止めた


日本人にとってごく普通の表現でしょうが、もしその言葉を***翻訳***使用と思えば、それは無理だと直ぐ分かる。無論日本人はいわゆる以心伝心を精神を応用して、聞いている人は言われて(書かれて)いない要素を黙って頭の中に足してしまう。しかし、日本人以外の人々にはそのまま通じはずは先ずないだろう。
明日=未来+止めた=過去形。まだ起きていない未来で既に何かを終了した。あり得ない。又は、「明日」と言う出来事を起こる前に中止した。それもなかなか考えられない。
英語で試して見よう:
* tomorrow stopped
* interrupted tomorrow
等。何れも "English speaker" には通じない。

【日本では)言うまでもないだろうが、「明日に予定していた事を明日で実行することを今日で実行するのを止めたと決めた」などの長蛇文がその二つの単語に秘めた。私は然程賢い人ではないが、そのようなことが日頃普通に行われているのは日本語のみではないでしょうか。

2/06/2014

東急グループ - 可愛そうな金持ち

翻訳会社を経由して東急グループと言うお客さんから翻訳の依頼が来た。分量は少々多いという話だが、過去からそのお客さんで安い料金で取引しているそうだ。
東急グループはどうみてもお金に困っている用に見えない。大企業でもある。

なのに日本の一般相場より低い、私の通常レートの40%ほどで仕事して頂戴との事。
当然、最高の品質を要求している。

さて、東急グループさんよ、貴社は高品質の品物を購入する際、中国の格安偽物より高い値段が付くのは「常識」として分かっているのではないでしょうか。
東急グループ不動産ぶもんなら、土地が坪単価100万円の土地をお金が有り余っている金持ちのお客さんに坪単価40万円で普通売るだろうか。
(少なくとも貧乏の一般庶民=私がそのような要望すれば「頭が可笑しいだろう」と言われるの間違いない!)