Category Archives: Topics in localization

At the beginning of this semester, I have to admit that I often confused IMUG with MIMUG. It takes me some time to figure out that these are two different events. But after that, I have to give credit to Professor Troyer for giving us access to this real-world speech. It’s right on campus so all you need to do is to get on campus to learn new stuff about the industry.

The one I want to focus on is the one on 11/29 given by Ben Cornelius on the topic of “Global Brands need Global Capabilities”. In this talk, he shared with us the general misconceptions and differences between the ordinary translation and globalization.

To him, there’s are several distinct differences between the two. He suggests that regardless of the scale of the company, every company have both internal and external needs to be filled when entering the global market. While most translation tasks are done externally, most globalization tasks are not. People who work in a globalization team has a unique role in the companies, unlike the translation team. There are two parts that separate the globalization team from the usual translation team, and here they are:

Investment & Recognition

Globalization teams spend a lot of money and efforts on their jobs only to let the other team take the credits. Globalization is a collective process of translation and localization. As a globalization crew, first you need to be able to translate the context, and then you need to make sure that the format, style, meaning fit in the target culture. Which means they have to go through every step you can possibly think of related to the translation/localization process

Translation, QA, Engineering, Project Management, Intelligence, People…

These might seem easy on the surface but no, don’t be fooled. Usually, each one of these tasks is assigned to a different professional individual when it comes to the translation side. Translator only needs to focus on translation, project manager manage and monitor the whole project and the localization engineers concentrate on getting the website, the engineering stuff to work, etc.

Sadly, that’s not the case for globalization team, they have to be able to go through all these processes mentioned above so that they can play their role-globalize their product. These abilities are required because as a globalization crew, you are like the final check before the launch of the product. Even though you have the materials provided by the relative team, you need to have somewhat equally good or preferably even better abilities of them to check if there’s an improvement to be made within those materials. However, even if they contribute to all the tasks, they don’t get their name to be put on the credit roll.

Create growth opportunities for both organizations and people around the world

Great globalizer relate inputs and results to each other. Thus, they can create opportunities for everyone. Some might argue that the existence of globalizer might be offshoring job opportunities. Sadly that’s not the case. Since they can help connect cultures and languages, they can actually help bring a more good product to a different culture. When people start migrating the product, they will need even more translators, PMs, and other related personals to complete the whole process, which is going to end with the checking of the globalizers before launch.

That was from the companies aspect, but what about the people? In what way do they benefit from the globalizing trend? Easy, more exposure to a different culture. The more transparent a culture is, the easier for people to relate. The easier for people to relate, the more we can minimize the misunderstandings and prejudice among cultures. A lot of the conflicts today are caused by misunderstandings. If we can minimize the gap as a globalizer, we can definitely fuel the communications of this global society.

Before listening to this talk, I personally still have some trouble distinguish the differences between translation and globalization even though I’m a TLM student. After this talk, I feel like I can explain the idea of the two clearly now. I have learned a lot from this talk. Hope all of you as well.

*Live at MiMUG-1

*Live at MiMUG-2

To be honest, I have never been to such event before in my past. Translation in Taiwan
is not really as prosperous and mature as it is in the U.S.(or at least not popular around my city even though foreign language and literature majors are everywhere) Let alone the localization industry. Thus, when I first heard about this event after coming to MIIS, I was super excited about it. Going to a professional event like this with all the possible future colleagues and employers can’t be any better. I had some expectations in mind before going to the event that day. Guess what? I was actually blown away by everything happened during IMUG the night.

The one I went to was a talk about “The Translation Technology Landscape today” given by Renato Beninatto. Before the event start, I have my first time socializing in such event. I was prepared to step out of my comfort zone and try to properly start a conversation with a random person at the event. Shockingly, that’s not the case. The whole place is filled with MIIS TLM students. Socializing would just be like us student having a usual talk at a different place. Never thought that we MIIS students would dominate a professional event like this. I know we MIIS students are a bunch of pioneers, but I wasn’t expecting it to be that serious. Nonetheless, the atmosphere is still quite different after we got several employers coming in. In the end, we are still able to get the gist of what it’s like to be socializing as an Asian student.

So on to the main talk, Mr. Beninatto started with introducing his own consulting company Nimdzi. Helping us get the idea of what the translation industry is like back in the past and what it is like in modern society. The history of translation technology really broadens my horizon. Thanks to the effort of these senior translators, the CAT tools were able to evolve alongside the technology. But most important of all, he spent some time discussing and emphasizing the idea of whether machine translation will take over the translation industry or not. Which is something I’ve been dealing with.

This has been an hot-debated topic to students who choose to walk down the path as a translator/localizer. People around kept on telling us to drop the idea of becoming translators because that machine translation like Google has been really helpful when it comes to simple translation task like translating a simple word or phrase. To them, the era of human translation has already come to an end. We are stepping into the abyss. On the other hand, we, as a translation major, firmly believe that machine translation is good, but not that good. I found both sides make sense to me so I can’t really tell which side is right or wrong. As a result, I was eager to hear what a current translation entrepreneur has to offer on this topic.

To my surprise, he said,’Yes, machine translation has taken over the role of a human translator. They are capable of providing high-quality translation work. Although there’s still something to be improved, I have to say that the time of human translation is taken over by the machine translation.’ I was shocked at the moment. I didn’t know how to react to it. It feels like I have been making stupid decisions all these time. As if I was wasting my youth and money on a dying industry with no future.

Thankfully, he hasn’t finished his sentence. He continued, “But that only means that there’s a shift to the role of human translators, we no longer need to work on our own, we have machine translation as a solid backup to help make our lives easier. We, as a human translator, are no longer the “translator”. Instead, we’re the modifier of the translation industry. Indeed, Machine translation is good alright, but not that good yet. You young, future translators have my word. Machine translation is our friend, not our enemy. Trust me, there’s no doubt a shift in the translation industry, but it’s an upward change.”

I believe that after hearing what Mr. Beninatto has to say, all of the present MIIS students must have let out a sigh of relief. Thank goodness we’re not wasting our time, instead, we’re actually the pioneer to a whole new era of translation. I got to say that I’m definitely impressed by IMUG. Although Mr. Beninatto had a real potty mouth which really surprises me, participating in such event really can broaden your horizon and clear some of the doubts and worries of yours.

*The new trend of the translation/localization industry

*MT trends