| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10] > | Clients / large translation companies now talking about pooling linguistic data. Should we be there? Thread poster: Henry Dotterer
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Vito Smolej
Germany
Local time: 09:57
Member (2004)
English to Slovenian
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SITE LOCALIZER | "The news of our death has been grossly exaggerated" | Jul 24, 2008 |
it would not hurt for us to have more confidence as an industry.
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The idea of making TMs a tradeable asset still causes a knee-jerk reaction. In my case too (g). But, as the Red Queen said:"It takes all the running to stay in the same place" - at the front.
regards
Vito
| | | | Iwan Davies 
United Kingdom
Local time: 08:57
German to English
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| Asset management | Jul 24, 2008 |
Henry D wrote: Hi all, TAUS Data Association Incorporated by Group of 40 Founding Members
Amsterdam, June 30, 2008: Forty organizations active in buying and supplying translation services and technologies have jointly established a new industry association aimed at sharing parallel language data with the objective to stimulate innovation and automation of translation activities. The TAUS Data Association (TDA)... For the whole thing, see: http://www.translationautomation.com/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&catid=45:news_archive&id=173:press-release&Itemid=46 It strikes me that translators, and to some extent small companies, are not yet represented, even though we might benefit from, and also contribute to, efforts such as these. Two questions: 1. Does this topic matter to your business? How? 2. Should ProZ.com join as a company, maybe with a designated attendee or two (translator and small company) from among our members?
I think translator organizations such as ProZ.com and CIoL and ITI definitely have an interest (and possibly also a responsibility to their members) in following developments closely - whether or not TAUS members are happy to let you on board is another matter...
I understand Ralf's point that it's more about automation than developing full-scale machine translation, but I also think it's got a lot to do with asset management and control. As freelancers and small translation company owners, this is where I see ProZ.com members as having the most to "fear" from such developments, with the bigger boys reclaiming possession of the ball.
Iwan
| | | | RobinB
United States
Local time: 02:57
German to English
| Horses and courses (as usual) | Jul 24, 2008 |
Henry,
This latest development at TAUS was mentioned briefly at the Denver conference last week, but I don't think there's a general feeling that it's of much relevance outside large-scale, mass market localization. Though of course it's good to see Jaap being usefully employed again
A look at the membership indicates that it's mainly drawn from Tiers 1 and 2 of the software manufacturer and localization ... See more Henry,
This latest development at TAUS was mentioned briefly at the Denver conference last week, but I don't think there's a general feeling that it's of much relevance outside large-scale, mass market localization. Though of course it's good to see Jaap being usefully employed again
A look at the membership indicates that it's mainly drawn from Tiers 1 and 2 of the software manufacturer and localization vendor sides, basically the "usual suspects". No doubt they can leverage some efficiency gains here, but I would rate the potential economies of both scale and scope as being fairly limited. And the fact that the European Commission has decided to donate its pretty awful TM data won't exactly improve the quality of the TAUS resources.
The relevance of TAUS, certainly as it currently stands, for the premium "straight" (largely narrative) segment of the translation market is as good as nil. Resource sharing hardly ever happens here, largely because the subject area expertise embedded in the linguistic resources represents much of the value added of this segment's players, as well as their uniques. It's this knowledge and expertise, and these resources, that allow us to keep well ahead of the sort of LSPs that are represented in the TDA.
TMs as assets: For specialized providers, they are certainly very valuable IP assets. But for TDA members, I'd say they're merely tradable commodities. Maybe it's down to the difference between knowledge and data.
MT: I wouldn't entirely discount the near-term impact of MT, but I don't think that premium segment providers will have anything at all to fear until 3rd generation hybrid systems start to mature (say, 8 to 10 years).
Lack of translators: The TDA comment that "There are simply not enough translators in the world to meet the rapidly growing demand for translations" is, I think, disingenuous. While this claim certainly holds true for the premium segment, I don't think it applies to the mass market offerings of the TDA-type LSPs, who seem to have little difficulty in daisy-chaining work down to translators with no subject area expertise and no identifiable native language, living in countries most of us have never heard of. At the high end of the market, there is most definitely a critical shortage of translators. While this most likely varies by language and subject combination, I find it difficult to believe that there are language combinations, including English-Turkish, where demand does not massively outstrip supply in certain subject areas. But these areas are generally covered by smaller, specialized LSPs and freelances, rather than the larger LSPs. That's why deep specialization is also the best strategy for long-term success in the translation business for individuals and small LSPs.
Overall, I think that ProZ might dilute its growing industry reputation as a neutral platform if it were to become too involved in heavily skewed initiatives such as the TDA. But hey, it's your money
(to which I'd like to add a comment that it's my experience that the prime motive for launching new associations in the language industry is normally that a very small number of people want to make money. Nothing inherently wrong with that, but it should always be borne in mind).
Robin
[Edited at 2008-07-24 11:43] ▲ Collapse
| | | | Marc P (X)
Local time: 09:57
German to English
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I am surprised that ProZ should consider presenting itself as a representative of freelance translators' interests at TAUS.
One, TAUS is clearly a body representing large-volume buyers of translation. For freelance translators to have "representation" on it strikes me as illogical - rather like a business seeking representation in a trade union.
Two, ProZ is a commercial entity providing services to freelance translators. It has customers, not members. I agree with Medi... See more I am surprised that ProZ should consider presenting itself as a representative of freelance translators' interests at TAUS.
One, TAUS is clearly a body representing large-volume buyers of translation. For freelance translators to have "representation" on it strikes me as illogical - rather like a business seeking representation in a trade union.
Two, ProZ is a commercial entity providing services to freelance translators. It has customers, not members. I agree with MediaMatrix' view that ProZ does not have a mandate to "represent" even its own (paying) customers in professional issues, much less the "community" or the translation profession.
Three, as a commercial entity, it would be logical for ProZ to seek to create a similar initiative to that being set up by TAUS. ProZ already provides a platform for the pooling of linguistic data; that is precisely what KudoZ is. I am not suggesting that I would necessarily favour ProZ doing so (nor that I think I should have any say in the matter), but it would at least be compatible with ProZ' business structure. Acting as a lobby for freelance translators is not, as I see it.
I agree with Iwan that it is the task of translators' associations, as representatives of the translation profession (unlike him, I do not include ProZ, as a commercial body, under this heading) to monitor developments, particularly if the TAUS venture is being presented as a generic industry initiative (helping "all industry players to increase the level of translation automation and stimulate interoperability and innovation of business models") rather than as a collaborative effort between a select group of translation buyers.
As Iwan has pointed out, the issue is that of asset management. Translation memories are a by-product of the translation process from which TAUS members clearly hope to gain greater leverage. If the value of this asset is to be substantially enhanced with the objective of reducing the cost of translation services, as is hoped by TAUS, it should perhaps prompt the question of whether translators should begin charging for providing translation memories, or for assigning copyright to them. I am not suggesting at this point, note, that translators do so - merely pointing out that I find it strange for consumers to be talking about "innovative business models", and not producers.
Marc ▲ Collapse
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| TAUS seems open to our participation | Jul 24, 2008 |
Iwan Davies wrote:
I think translator organizations such as ProZ.com and CIoL and ITI definitely have an interest (and possibly also a responsibility to their members) in following developments closely - whether or not TAUS members are happy to let you on board is another matter...
I spoke to them before posting this thread. The impression I get is that our participation would be welcome.
| | | | | Thanks, RobinB | Jul 24, 2008 |
Thanks for posting, RobinB. Lots of interesting points.
I'd like to better understand one part of what you wrote:
RobinB wrote:
The relevance of TAUS, certainly as it currently stands, for the premium "straight" (largely narrative) segment of the translation market is as good as nil. Resource sharing hardly ever happens here, largely because the subject area expertise embedded in the linguistic resources represents much of the value added of this segment's players, as well as their uniques. It's this knowledge and expertise, and these resources, that allow us to keep well ahead of the sort of LSPs that are represented in the TDA.
If I understand you correctly, linguistic assets are important in keeping you ahead of the mainstream competition. Right? If so, why does sharing never happen? It would seem to me that if TMs, etc. are differentiators, those who share, thereby enriching their resources, would get ahead. No?
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Marc P wrote:
... As Iwan has pointed out, the issue is that of asset management. Translation memories are a by-product of the translation process from which TAUS members clearly hope to gain greater leverage. If the value of this asset is to be substantially enhanced with the objective of reducing the cost of translation services, as is hoped by TAUS, it should perhaps prompt the question of whether translators should begin charging for providing translation memories, or for assigning copyright to them. I am not suggesting at this point, note, that translators do so - merely pointing out that I find it strange for consumers to be talking about "innovative business models", and not producers.
I agree. Whether in TAUS or not, producers should be talking, too.
| | | | | Still not sure | Jul 24, 2008 |
Mmmmmm... I agree with Ralf, Marina, Marc P., The Misha and most of the colleagues that stated their doubts about this issue.
I went through all the posts, read all the reasons given pro and against, but I still have my own doubts, still not sure whether this may help us translators and suspicious about the goals and purpose of TAUS.
It`s a welcome debate, though.
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| big companies pooling their resources... | Jul 24, 2008 |
to drive rates even further down and make big fat profits for themselves...
they get our TMs, they pool them together creating a vast resource, they use this resource to ask for even more discounts and still charge big bucks to their clients... this is how it works...
[Edited at 2008-07-24 14:34]
| | | | | Let's translate.... | Jul 24, 2008 |
...TAUS's press release. In a world where words are carefully chosen to avoid revealing the true goals, put other people on your side and make you look sensible when you are just trying to reduce your costs, translating some of the statements in the TAUS press release is a must. Let me try:
TAUS English: "sharing parallel language data with the objective to stimulate innovation and automation of translation activities"
Plain English: "putting together dissimilar translation me... See more ...TAUS's press release. In a world where words are carefully chosen to avoid revealing the true goals, put other people on your side and make you look sensible when you are just trying to reduce your costs, translating some of the statements in the TAUS press release is a must. Let me try:
TAUS English: "sharing parallel language data with the objective to stimulate innovation and automation of translation activities"
Plain English: "putting together dissimilar translation memories in order to prepare corporate VLTMs for all of us to use and to save big bucks by creating more matches translators will have to use and edit at no or little cost"
TAUS: "Members will be able to select and pool data to increase translation efficiency and improve translation quality"
Plain English: "Members will have access to a huge memory to reduce costs no matter what quality is in the memories really"
TAUS: "There are simply not enough translators in the world to meet the rapidly growing demand"
English: "There are simply not enough translators accepting the rates members are offering"
TAUS: "The language search allows translators, customer support staff, product developers and marketers, end-users and any other professionals to find translations of phrases"
English: "The language search will allow members to lower translator rates, as 'all terminology will be already there'"
TAUS: "The European Commission has also agreed to donate its parallel language data to be shared through TDA."
English: "The European Commission will be happy to enjoy access to everybody else's data"
Cheers everyone! ▲ Collapse
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Good work, Tomás.
Interesting translation. What TM did you use? Any CAT tool?
| | | | | The prices for bad translations are falling (maybe) | Jul 24, 2008 |
Selcuk Akyuz wrote:
Look at the discussions at ProZ.com, agencies asking for USD 0.03 per word! There are not enough translators but the prices are falling! Something should be wrong with the law of supply and demand.
From what I see, the prices for good-quality translations are not falling, and may actually be increasing.
The prices for rock bottom translations might be falling (maybe), but don't confuse the situation of the bottom dwellers with those of the industry in general.
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| What if the pooled TMs are made available back to translators? | Jul 24, 2008 |
Giovanni Guarnieri MITI, MIL wrote:
big companies pooling their resources...
to drive rates even further down and make big fat profits for themselves...
they get our TMs...
What if, with ProZ.com participating in this group, it were possible to make the pooled resource available to ProZ.com members? In that case -- with translators getting back access to the linguistic assets they create -- would some balance be restored?
I don't know whether this would be possible in TAUS. I asked, but if I understood correctly, a policy has not yet been formed. The impression I got is that this concept had not yet been considered.
| | | | RobinB
United States
Local time: 02:57
German to English
| Why no sharing? | Jul 24, 2008 |
Henry D wrote: If I understand you correctly, linguistic assets are important in keeping you ahead of the mainstream competition. Right?
Right. But in the high-end, premium segment of the market (probably less than 5% of the overall market by volume, considerably more by value), it's the smaller guys who are the mainstream. The large LSPs don't make much of a dent here at all. You could say that they're not architected to leverage the specific dynamics and exploit the specific constraints of this segment, if you were into a bit of buzzword bingo.
If so, why does sharing never happen?
This segment is IP-driven to a significant extent. IP is most valuable if it's proprietary, or marketable, or both. You can leverage your IP to carve out a successful translation market niche, and/or to sell it at a price that reflects your input (intellectual effort). So where are the benefits of simply sharing it with your competitors?
Of course that doesn't mean that a limited amount of sharing doesn't go on, for example in the form of seminar and workshop content and handouts (which of course come at a modest price). And we share IP with the handful of freelances we work with because there's a mutual benefit.
It would seem to me that if TMs, etc. are differentiators, those who share, thereby enriching their resources, would get ahead. No?
I don't see it happening this way. The owners would be giving away quite a lot of what makes them successful in the market, and what would they get in return? More of what they already have? The reusability of much of this IP is heavily limited in any case. For example, we estimate that less than 5% of financial reporting TM content for a customer is reusable across other customers.
There's certainly a place for initiatives such as the TDA or tmmarketplace.com, but I see these more in the commodity localization space than in high-end narrative translation.
If you believe that ProZ should somehow get involved in translation data exchange, I personally think that you could consider helping to promote interchange format standards such as TMX, TBX and XLIFF (and especially the latter) and encourage their take-up by tools manufacturers so that users (above all translators) can concentrate on buying or leasing (SaaS) tools with features that best meet their own requirements, rather than being forced into using - generally expensive - captive systems that use proprietary data formats. A more open market for translation tools would, I think, represent a significant step forward in user choice and overall tool adoption, and contribute significantly to growth in tool market maturity.
Andre can tell you what LSPs at the Englewood conference think about the current tools market situation.
Robin
[Edited at 2008-07-24 20:23]
| | | | RobinB
United States
Local time: 02:57
German to English
| Not so much the bottom dwellers | Jul 24, 2008 |
Riccardo Schiaffino wrote: The prices for rock bottom translations might be falling (maybe), but don't confuse the situation of the bottom dwellers with those of the industry in general.
or bottom feeders, but the bottom food (the marine snow that drifts down to the bottom).
Nice to see you in Englewood. There are certainly some interesing new/newish tools that have now reached market maturity as attractive alternatives to the incumbents.
Robin
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