On March 22-24 (2017), fifty people came together in a former clandestine church in Amsterdam to break their heads on the question how the translation industry will have changed in 2022. The story that came out can be read as an ordinary battle between man and machine, with a victory for the latter. But at a deeper layer, there is a fascinating intrigue with many threads about game-changing technologies and trends and an outcome that is perplexing even for all of us who think that they are behind the wheel today. Be careful what you wish for.
The translation companies of today will not be the same in 2022. We’ll see a split in translation tech and the creative networks, the data factories and the storytelling, the platforms and the boutiques, perhaps sometimes still operating under the same umbrella, but clearly separated in functions. Sounds familiar, this story? Perhaps you are thinking about the paradigm shift in the advertising and marketing industry. Once thought to be so creative, it had its own unique place in an environment of factory and office automation. But now, after a few decades of data storms, the business of the prestigious advertising agencies has changed, fundamentally.
Marketing is automated and driven by data and clicks. The incredibly rapid rise of online ads, razor-sharp marketing, and pay-per-view through companies like Google and Facebook has turned the landscape upside down. Legendary names like Saatchi and Saatchi, McCann Erickson, J. Walter Thompson give us sweet memories of the days of Mad Men, but the creative directors now all report to giant holding companies acting under dull names like Omnicon, WPP, Interpublic and Publicis.
Similar mergers and acquisitions are likely to happen in the relative small translation industry in the coming five years and a convergence with that other creative sector that has fallen victim to data storms – the advertising and marketing industry – would make a lot of sense.
But before we get there, let’s look at the story that developed in Amsterdam just a few weeks ago. The story is broken down into ten chapters, all interconnected, like in every good novel.
Comments about this article
Verenigde Staten
Local time: 22:07
Russisch naar Engels
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Local time: 22:07
Engels naar Spaans
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Mr. Dolina went on to describe briefly what he saw in American society: fostering of competitiveness and comparison since school, charts, who's the most popular student, who'll be class president, etc. That alone should be a topic of ... See more
Mr. Dolina went on to describe briefly what he saw in American society: fostering of competitiveness and comparison since school, charts, who's the most popular student, who'll be class president, etc. That alone should be a topic of research by sociologists, but it bears mentioning here because we're letting ourselves become conditioned by this pervasive and unhealthy competitive spirit: what's the most popular translator website, what's the best translation of this or that book, what are the 10 most important things a freelancer should or should not do, etc.
So, this preoccupation with future trends or events is not just distracting but unhealthy. I would add, it is just stupid and unworthy of the attention of professional translators.
Finally, as far as our profession is concerned, there is no 'translation industry', period. Those who insist there is one, they're trying to sell you something. ▲ Collapse
Oostenrijk
Local time: 04:07
Lid 2016
Duits naar Frans
Competition has gone up and big companies are sharing and reselling their TM and having the main chunks of translations done in low costs area.
I'd rather say the business is being split at the same average price. There are the translations made using TM or pretranslated. There will continue to move to the lowest bidder.
For some clients there is no expectation of quality. Once company i used to know ... See more
Competition has gone up and big companies are sharing and reselling their TM and having the main chunks of translations done in low costs area.
I'd rather say the business is being split at the same average price. There are the translations made using TM or pretranslated. There will continue to move to the lowest bidder.
For some clients there is no expectation of quality. Once company i used to know and said they were losing business opportunities due to their clients feeling being taken rudely refused to take a linguist to solve the problem. They continue to search for an international experienced SALESMAN. They said they do not need a linguist they need a salesman. If they wanted their texts translated in a way that no one understand they will call for a translation agency. They had no idea that a real linguist could have helped their salesman by making them better aware of cross cultural differences.
On the other side there are the clients that are starting to understand that the translation is the window of the company and you cannot use a TM that had gone through the world and had been created for a a different product. This client will refuse TM, will want a new translation from scratch every time and will be very demanding on translation, proofreading and editing (and not just a spellcheck done by the PM of the agency). You will have to be very talented to keep on with these clients they want better than human perfection.
There is a third kind of client emerging. The one with a deep distrust of this global village stuff. They want the translator to be living in the area and go into their premises and these are ready to pay more; or cover the hassles of having a sworn translation for a private letter just to be sure that the translation had not circled 3 times the world before it reach the end translator but the end translator is a local whom they can keep his/her name on the translation - thum the translator being a humain being again.
The difficult thing when you are starting is to be talented enough to move out of the TM base pool to the base of clients seeing you are a person and respecting as such. Only there the prices will hold to a level you can live with.
About the prices, when i first used Proz in 2004 on another account, it was much easier as a beginner to get the average price you get now with 15 years experience. Many end clients were not searching online but paying the local price. I would not set my hopes too high on the prices increasing as a whole but maybe the pool of clients having bad experiences with the global village translations will continue to increase and it might come back to what it was 10 years ago.
[Edited at 2017-04-23 16:32 GMT]
[Edited at 2017-04-23 16:39 GMT] ▲ Collapse
Verenigde Staten
Local time: 22:07
Duits naar Engels
As I recall, 20 years ago the ATA income survey showed an annual average of $65K for full-time US translators. The most recent survey showed a less than 10% average income growth, which in real terms represents slippage. I doubt if many translators these days dream of making $100K/year. Translators are working harder just to maintain their standard of living. ▲ Collapse
Portugal
Local time: 03:07
Lid 2007
Engels naar Portugees
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... I have no crystal ball and, health permitting, I'll keep working at my own pace and doing what I want and can do whatever the evolution of the “translation industry”.
Please allow me to digress slightly from this topic but some dates seem to have a strange effect on my mind: at first sight, 2022 seemed to me very distant in time, when in fact we are just five years away…
Denemarken
Local time: 04:07
Lid 2003
Deens naar Engels
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OK, I have done some guessing and calculating myself for a couple of rushed jobs over the last weekend, when I could not get hold of the client to ask. However, I found solutions based on my experience and an colleague's KudoZ answer. (THANK YOU, i... See more
OK, I have done some guessing and calculating myself for a couple of rushed jobs over the last weekend, when I could not get hold of the client to ask. However, I found solutions based on my experience and an colleague's KudoZ answer. (THANK YOU, it saved me a big headache!) They were guaranteed very different from anything a machine could come up with. I know for sure the KudoZ answer was correct, and I believe the others are - I could see that they matched details from the specific case I was working on.
These were abbreviations for products and statutory procedures and inspections, and there is no way a machine can be sure of finding the right one in a TM.
When Stephen Hawking works out what is going on in a black hole out in space, we have to believe him, because no one else has ever been there to check. He uses logic and reasoning far beyond any computer - and most human brains!
Setting a computer to calculate what LVE stands for in Danish and pick the right answer is not a question of algorithms. I found an approximate answer, which was wrong, and was going to add a footnote, until I checked my KudoZ question one more time...
It takes a human with time to find things like that, and there are far too many examples for machines to be reliable.
Another mechanical PITA which I hope will be relegated to the scrap heap is the practice of using software like X-bench and PerfectIT to check quality. They can be useful to check numbers and consistency, but mechanical consistency is sometimes incorrect - languages differ in their usage. (Cardinal numbers, percentages, dates, punctuation differences...)
There are routine texts where MT is almost acceptable, though the result is often un-idiomatic and difficult to read. For things that are here today and mulched tomorrow, they can be good enough.
I hope that in five years' time clients will be getting a better idea of when they can make do with industrial translation, and when they need a professional job! ▲ Collapse
Verenigde Staten
Local time: 22:07
Russisch naar Engels
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Companies which want to buy too many PMs should think twice--it is like publishers buying unrelated paragraphs, from different book. And, always have 1929 in mind. Edited posts disappear, by the way. The same problem as some time ago.
Local time: 22:07
Engels naar Spaans
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I'm more concerned about Microsoft's dominance in Europe: by European law, governments should require open standards on software bids, but Microsoft has about 70 lobbysts in Europe pushing local governments and the EU the other way: pay expensive s... See more
I'm more concerned about Microsoft's dominance in Europe: by European law, governments should require open standards on software bids, but Microsoft has about 70 lobbysts in Europe pushing local governments and the EU the other way: pay expensive software licenses to keep European governments captive for years to come.
Now that is more relevant to me than any idiotic futurist report, including Google's Kurzweil's pronouncements about the 'singularity.' ▲ Collapse
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