In the past few weeks, I've spoken with a few freelancers who would like to work with direct clients but are afraid that they won't get paid. One commented that she really enjoys working with agencies because of being able to check Payment Practices or a similar resource in order to determine the … [Read more...] about Ensuring payment from direct clients
The importance of down time
Here at Thoughts on Translation, I've been working on a loosely organized series of posts inspired by summer. A few weeks ago I wrote about ways to handle summer as a freelancing mom or dad; now let's talk about the importance of down time in our freelance lives. In the not-so-distant past (I'm 38 … [Read more...] about The importance of down time
Tranfree is back
Happily for freelance translators everywhere, Alex Eames has revived his free ezine Tranfree. The current issue (71), features two excellent articles, one on "Getting the balance right: preventing and coping with staleness" by Alex himself, and "Tools that have brought smiles to my face, cheer to my … [Read more...] about Tranfree is back
How to be a better proofreader
If you're looking to move up in the translation market, more effective proofreading is critical. If you're the type of person who cringes at the sight of an error in print, make sure that your translations aren't contributing to the problem, and give your clients that extra quality step that marks … [Read more...] about How to be a better proofreader
Tech tip: wrapping text around a table in OpenOffice
This is a small tip but it really helped me on a recent project. Normally, OpenOffice Writer doesn't allow you to wrap text around a table. So if you have a table on the left side of the page and text on the right side, it ends up looking like this: This can be a problem when you're translating … [Read more...] about Tech tip: wrapping text around a table in OpenOffice