Forum | Topic | Title | Text | Poster | Time |
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Translator resources | General strike against TRADOS and other expensive CAT tools | What is your definition of expensive? | A CAT tool is an investment like any other. If the ROI justifies the purchase, it is not too expensive. If it doesn't, but you invest anyway, you should strike against your own lack of bas | Speranza | Feb 19, 2011 |
Business issues | What happens when you see a translation test in internet forums? | Nothing happens | Come on, Argyro, let's not overrate prosaic stuff like knowledge, or ability to open a dictionary, or owning a dictionary for that matter. Translation has nothing to do with that, it is an | Speranza | Feb 10, 2011 |
Translation Theory and Practice | Aren't these agencies taking too far? | Nothing fishy or unprofessional here | That they "are not requesting a marked up document from the reviewer, only an evaluation" does not mean "they are not allowed to disclose it": it means there's nothing to disclose. The age | Speranza | Oct 18, 2010 |
Business issues | "My usual rate for Indians is X" - insulting to an agency? | Business as usual | Price discrimination is a normal part of business. It is lamentable that many translators are economically illiterate enough to find this practice absurd. In terms of money, business s | Speranza | Jul 29, 2010 |
Poll Discussion | Poll: Are you planning to take some time off work to watch the World-Cup? | Most certainly yes | Not only take time off, but also host a few viewing parties. We'll raise our glasses to you, people who find the idea of getting unglued from your computers for 90 minutes outrageous :) | Speranza | Jun 12, 2010 |
Business issues | Anyone know why we are paying Lionbridge to work with them? | Wrong | Jeff,
you got some of these backwards.
When you run a business, you don't get to work 9 to 5, Monday through Friday, and take a sick leave whenever you catch a cold. That's what empl | Speranza | Jun 5, 2010 |
Business issues | Anyone know why we are paying Lionbridge to work with them? | "It sank." | [quote]Sergei Tumanov wrote:
why we are being charged They need money. [/quote] Sergei, you should go East and run for President. | Speranza | Jun 3, 2010 |
Money matters | How much do you make? | Data | For a thread started with a question that most people apparently would rather not answer, this one is generating replies pretty fast :). I'll contribute some indirect (and therefore pos | Speranza | May 31, 2010 |
Getting established | The importance of becoming a member to proz.com | Unimportant | In terms of getting clients, ProZ membership is unimportant exactly because it's cheap. It takes a costly signal to make a message credible (in this case, the message that you are a valuab | Speranza | May 5, 2010 |
Business issues | Lionbridge and IBM have announced an alliance to beat their competitors... | News from a week ago: IBM, Lionbridge to Offer Real-time Translation for Business | [quote]FarkasAndras wrote:
I received the email, too, and couldn't make heads or tails of it. [/quote] It's very simple: in a move aimed at adding insult to injury, LB is now goi | Speranza | Apr 29, 2010 |
Poll Discussion | Poll: What is the worst that can ever happen to a translator? | We may need some perspective | Now this is interesting indeed. Am I the only translator whose list of the worst things that can ever happen includes stuff like a loved one's death, a friend getting seriously ill, family | Speranza | Apr 26, 2010 |
Business issues | Lionbridge's Translation Workspace: a letter voicing concerns | What is different about it? | This is a wonderful illustration of an already obvious fact: there's no limit to the amount of humiliation and disdain that some freelancers will happily tolerate. It contains a useful | Speranza | Apr 19, 2010 |
Business issues | Translation Workspace / Lionbridge CAT tool | Yes, they are | [quote]Maruja Limon wrote:
they are casting their nets into all oceans [/quote] They announced that on Twitter about two weeks ago. They also "think this is the future of translatio | Speranza | Mar 16, 2010 |
Business issues | Translation Workspace / Lionbridge CAT tool | Sounds familiar | [quote]Felipe Gútiez wrote:
The basic idea is: why on earth has someone to work on something that someone else has already worked and reached the solution? [/quote] Just wondering. | Speranza | Mar 12, 2010 |
Business issues | Translation Workspace / Lionbridge CAT tool | A whole page into the discussion... | ...and nobody has said it is only natural to pay agencies for the honor of working with them? Because that is how things work in the real world and we are facing recession and there's Indi | Speranza | Mar 4, 2010 |
Money matters | A project for 0.008 per word.. less than a penny a word | Apparently not a joke | A self-described "London-based translations agency serving top law firms, banks, and marketing, advertising and PR agencies" ("We offer translators an excellent service," they add) yes | Speranza | Mar 3, 2010 |
Money matters | pricing for 75%-99% reps match | Social engineering in action | [quote]Tomas Forro wrote:
Well Nadejda, but we all know this is just a sweet dream. [/quote] No, that is how things actually work unless you believe everything agencies tell you. | Speranza | Feb 26, 2010 |
Money matters | pricing for 75%-99% reps match | 100% | The fair rate is 100% of your rate. There is a good clue: if it is you who makes an investment, it is also you who gets the ROI. If agencies didn't pretend it is normal to offer discounts< | Speranza | Feb 25, 2010 |
Business issues | How to handle the receipt of a poor translation? | Agency or end client? | If you are an agency, it's your fault. Pay and never work with that translator again -- or with any other translator, for that matter, until you figure out a way to check qualifications be | Speranza | Feb 20, 2010 |
Business issues | On "getting established" (having 6 years of experience!) | Look for clients, not employers | Your entire list is essentially an extended version of "be active on ProZ" and "have a website." There is an Internet beyond ProZ and an offline world beyond the Internet. Approach the< | Speranza | Feb 20, 2010 |
ProZ.com suggestions | New feature suggested for ProZ job section | Upgrade it | I suggest taking this one step further and creating a separate website with similar forms for world hunger, human trafficking and numerous other issues that bother people. Talk all you wan | Speranza | Feb 15, 2010 |
Money matters | Word rates in euros and US dollars: do they seem to be identical? | They are what you make them | Do you mean rates that agencies get to pay to freelancers? Those are (or at least should be) established by the latter, so it's not like you can look at the outside world and suddenly | Speranza | Feb 4, 2010 |
Business issues | How do you organise your business day in order to optimise your earnings? | You mean you don't charge a per-unit rate? | [quote]Astrid Elke Johnson wrote:
I will need to know how many hours I expect to work for that amount of money. [/quote] Are you saying you charge a per-project fee and not a per-wor | Speranza | Feb 4, 2010 |
Business issues | How do you organise your business day in order to optimise your earnings? | Do not invent problems where there are none | [quote]Astrid Elke Johnson wrote:
that requires a lot of e-mail correspondence to negotiate the work. [/quote] No, it doesn't. If it is a regular client with the typical project, e- | Speranza | Feb 4, 2010 |
Business issues | Where does a translator's job start and where does it end? | Do what is right for you | You are a freelancer, which means you don't have a job description imposed from outside. As a business owner, you are free to decide what services you would like to offer. If editing is | Speranza | Feb 2, 2010 |
Business issues | Working for a non-paying agency? | Demand advance payment | My advice is, demand prepayment or reject the job. Considering their current BB rating, they are in no position to dictate terms of payment. They may have revamped their accounting system, | Speranza | Jan 23, 2010 |
Translation Theory and Practice | Translating deliberately inaccurate entity names | About the Office of Foreign Assets Control | I recently translated a document that involved the Office of Foreign Assets Control. It does indeed arrange sanctions against foreign entities, but that implies rules for U.S.-based busine | Speranza | Jan 20, 2010 |
Being independent | Working with agencies: content of purchase conditions | In brief | 1. From my experience, two scenarios are particularly common. Some agencies, when they need to assign a project, mass-mail all translators meeting project criteria (such as language | Speranza | Jan 19, 2010 |
Translation Theory and Practice | Translation of a College Name | I would go for option 2 | If the text contained Associação Internacional de Educação Continuada instead of the abbreviation, you wouldn't leave that part in Portuguese, right? | Speranza | Jan 18, 2010 |
Money matters | DTP - does it pay? | What are your alternatives? | Are you better off, financially and otherwise, doing DTP than dedicating that time to other activities? If you are, it pays; if you are not, it doesn't. (Edited to fix a typo.) < | Speranza | Jan 18, 2010 |
Money matters | 2nd Translator quoted about 80% less | Not necessarily a sign of poor quality | Chances are it is just an aggressive marketing strategy: if the client is promising and the other translator is confident s/he is the best choice for the job, s/he may be willing to offer | Speranza | Jan 18, 2010 |
Business issues | Do you really know your job/market, as a pro? (10k wds, legal, 5 langs: How much, via agency?) | What am I missing? | All professionals (even plumpers! who knew it was a profession?) know how much things cost in their markets. You claim to be a professional. Why, again, do you need to ask the question? | Speranza | Jan 12, 2010 |
Lighter side of trans/interp | You are working too hard on your computer when... | When you... | ...look at a bookcase and think you should zip some of those books because you're running out of space. (True story from the time when my brand-new computer had a 1 GB hard disk.) ...ex | Speranza | Oct 15, 2009 |
Trados support | Standard discounts for fuzzy matches, 100% matches and repetitions | Discounts? Why? | It's charming how agencies try to make it look like it's only natural that they should get return on your investment. Do you seriously want to cut your rates because you purchased a pricey | Speranza | Sep 10, 2009 |
Machine Translation (MT) | '[MT] is most often used alongside [TM] as an adjunct to human translation'. Are you using it? | Really? | [quote]Pablo Bouvier wrote:
my recommendation is that they look for another job that could not be easily exported to the East. [/quote] Since when is translation into Spanish (or a | Speranza | Aug 31, 2009 |
Off topic | Inglorious Basterds | For the sake of accuracy... | ...he said, "à votre famille et à vos vaches, je dis bravo." | Speranza | Aug 25, 2009 |
Off topic | How to keep your monitor clean - from inside | Not totally impossible | [quote]Aniello Scognamiglio wrote:
Now imagine Miss World instead of the cute dog ;-) [/quote] I remember seeing that kind of display cleaning service offered in Russia years ag | Speranza | Feb 28, 2009 |
Proofreading / Editing / Reviewing | Something that happened to me with a translation test | Not that I was surprised by the lack of logic, but still... | [quote]Rod Walters wrote:
I feel honour-bound to point that out to them.[/quote] So if you tell the client you know an acceptable translation is already available online, the problem | Speranza | Feb 21, 2009 |
Business issues | Your business is thriving in these awful times: tell us why! | How about practical solutions? | Wow, five pages of revolutionary insights into how important it is to translate well and on time, generously spiced with "don't be so arrogant, admit you're starving, too" remarks :-D. Fol | Speranza | Feb 16, 2009 |
Money matters | Credit Crunch hitting Translators? | "Do you suffer from nightmares?" – "Come on, Doc, I enjoy them..." | There is an upside to the crisis, too. Like, you enter your favorite (and normally crowded) eatery at 10 p.m. on a Saturday and immediately get a table you didn't even bother to book. Or y | Speranza | Feb 12, 2009 |
Money matters | We MUST quote in low-price jobs with OUR prices! | An inconvenient truth (not the movie) | [quote]Viktoria Gimbe wrote:
after the client finds out the hard way that you get what you pay for. [/quote] That is precisely the problem: Many of them never find that out, and i | Speranza | Feb 10, 2009 |
Money matters | We MUST quote in low-price jobs with OUR prices! | How about asking the crowd? | Judging by what James Surowiecki argues in his book which is both persuasive and fun, there is plenty of evidence that a simple poll (something like, "In 2009, translation rates will gener | Speranza | Feb 5, 2009 |
Money matters | who shall afford transfer fees | No abuse at all | [quote]Jose Ruivo wrote:
my clients in Europe have never tried to impose such thing. [/quote] That's because bank transfers within the E.U. are often free, and when they are n | Speranza | Feb 3, 2009 |
Translation Theory and Practice | Translating in Joomla? | Is this becoming a popular requirement? | I have so far had only one request that involved Joom!Fish. Am now wondering if I should check out the software after all. | Speranza | Feb 2, 2009 |
ProZ.com membership | Making the most of my membership | How much do looks matter? | You may want to check out this blog post to get some insight into how a more professionally diverse group of individuals sees the issue. That one is about good vs. poor looks; as to | Speranza | Feb 1, 2009 |
Business issues | Have you considered an MBA? | Practical knowledge vs. business school certificates | I have a few friends holding MBAs from very respectable schools and boasting years in top management roles, and I can tell you they don't know nearly as much about running a business as we | Speranza | Jan 30, 2009 |
Money matters | We MUST quote in low-price jobs with OUR prices! | Think twice | While the number of bids is visible to all, their content, including the rates, remains private. A new outsourcer or an inexperienced freelancer trying to figure out what rates are OK for | Speranza | Jan 29, 2009 |
Off topic | Did you ever wonder... (Why the sun lightens our hair, but darkens our skin?) etc. | Come on efreitag, | of course cat food is made to please humans. Do you think it comes in nifty glossy packaging and is sometimes fish-shaped because cats prefer it that way? | Speranza | Jan 29, 2009 |
Off topic | Did you ever wonder... (Why the sun lightens our hair, but darkens our skin?) etc. | Mascara-2, cats and needles | Same here, no mouth opening when applying mascara :) As to cat food, I read somebody had experimented with that and the cats turned their nose away. Not sure if this is true or not, but | Speranza | Jan 29, 2009 |
Money matters | An attorney called me... (response from customer to complaint regarding non-payment) | Why are you even considering taking anything less than the full amount? | [quote]Luisa Ramos wrote:
That someone wrote to me and told me that she did not have authority for that kind of money, but that he knew I had to be paid. He then asked me to review the< | Speranza | Jan 23, 2009 |
Open discussion on topics related to translation, interpreting and localization
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