Training for Translators

Classes for translators and interpreters


Corinne McKay

Translators for the win!

Book prize season is always fun, especially when translators get the spotlight. In 2015, the Booker Prize Foundation decided to award the Man Booker International Prize exclusively to works of fiction translated into English, as of the 2016 awards. Even better (if you’re a translator!) was their decision to split the 50,000 pound prize money equally between the author and the translator.

This year’s prize was announced yesterday, and we in Colorado are beyond thrilled to see our very own Denverite Jessica Cohen recognized for her Hebrew-to-English translation of David Grossman’s novel A Horse Walks Into a Bar. Jessica is a lovely and generous person as well as an incredible translator, and we had the good fortune to have her do a presentation on literary translation at our local mid-year conference a few years back.

If you’re looking for some summer reading, the books on the shortlist all look amazing. My only suggestion to the Booker Prize folks: tell us what language the books were translated from–translators like to geek out on those things!


Corinne McKay

Next session of Getting Started as a Freelance Translator

Greetings, readers! I apologize for the radio silence here over the past couple of weeks (lots of big translation projects going on!), and I have a couple of posts in the works that will go up soon.

My online courses always take a pause over the summer, but I wanted to let you know that the September session of Getting Started as a Freelance Translator is open for registration at the Early Bird rate of $380. This session is filling up pretty quickly, so now is a good time to register if you like to plan ahead!

This is a four-week online session for beginning translators in any language combination, anywhere in the world. Over the four weeks, you’ll do 12 online videos at your own pace, and you’ll complete four homework assignments that I will give you individualized feedback on: your translation-targeted resume and cover e-mail, rates and billable hours sheet, marketing plan, and online presence. We also do eight live question and answer sessions (recordings provided if you can’t attend live), so that you can get all of your questions about freelance translation answered. When you’re looking at online courses, I think it’s important to pick one that offers individual feedback and the opportunity to ask questions, which all of my courses do.

A past student in this class commented, “Neither in my undergraduate classes in education nor in some of the more practical classes I took as part of my MA in English (including the course connected to my assistantship as a writing consultant) did I ever experience one course that delivered as much precise and helpful information as this course.” If you’d like to launch your freelance business on the right foot, reserve your spot today and join us on September 6 when the course kicks off.


Corinne McKay

Are low rates and robots coming to get us?

Here’s a post I’ve been meaning to write for a while…and since my main work computer picked last night as a good time to die (don’t worry…everything was backed up), I have some time on my hands while it’s being repaired. This post is in response to various questions I’ve gotten from readers, colleagues, and students over the past few months, along the lines of:

“I came across a company based here in Paris who asks translators to sign up to a platform in order to submit their work for free (or for a coffee mug if you’re very good), and I wondered if you had any thoughts on the changing landscape of the freelance market for translators.”

“Are you worried about MT encroaching into certain translation markets, or into the translation industry as a whole?”

“Do you think translators should be looking for other jobs?”

I think these questions speak to a general uncertainty about, as the first questioner put it, the changing landscape of the freelance translation market. So let’s dive in; I’ll give my thoughts and you can give yours in the comments.

Short answer: Yes, things are changing in our industry. More people are doing freelance work in general, and more people are entering our industry through non-traditional pathways that may make them more amenable to lower rates. It’s getting harder and harder to make a living at the low end of our industry and there’s more competition at the high end, as more people opt out of the low end. Machine translation is certainly going to make some inroads into the “information-only” translation market, and into specializations where controlled vocabulary is an option. At the same time, I don’t think that our entire industry is going the way of the stagecoach driver. In fact, I think these changes might separate out the clients who want, need, and are willing to pay for really good translations. And for certain languages and specializations, MT simply is not a viable competitor to human translators for any type of project, and perhaps never will be.

I think the main choice we need to make is: If you’re going to work in the translation industry into the foreseeable future, do you want to be a translation software specialist, or a writer?

Longer answer: All of these are factors I think about in my own business. When I started in the industry (insert cranky old-timer voice) fifteen years ago, things were different. Even the mega-agencies generally paid non-peanuts rates, and most freelancers simply would not work for minimum wage. But lots of things have changed since then. I recently read a Freelancers Union survey stating that about 34% of Americans are independent workers, and that number is expected to increase by about 50% by 2020. That reality causes some shifts. As an example, I’ve recently talked to various beginning translators who’ve told me something along the lines of, “I currently work as a barista/nanny/museum guard/bilingual administrative assistant, making $9.25 an hour plus tips with no benefits or paid time off. So if I could make $20 an hour and work from home on my own schedule, I’d be thrilled.” I’m not blaming them or saying that that outlook is negative, but it exists, and it has an effect on the market as a whole.

Now, what about MT? I’m not an MT hater, at all. As I often explain to my clients, I use Google Translate myself…just not for anything other than a general gist of meaning. If I’m going on vacation to Italy and want to know what days a museum is open and closed, Google Translate does the job. When a client in Switzerland forgets that I don’t speak German and e-mails me about a translation auf Deutsch, Google Translate can usually provide a pretty good approximation of what they’re asking. If I translated for industries where translations are mostly done for informational purposes only, mostly include only a limited range of vocabulary, and where there’s some tolerance for bad writing or even minor mistranslations (think of the little user pamphlets that come with things like earbuds and can openers…), I’d be doing some strategizing. I’d ask myself: if the trends in MT, including neural networking, continue, am I going to be happy translating and post-editing 6,000 or 10,000 words a day for a couple of cents a word? Or would I rather look elsewhere?

In my own work, I’ve made a deliberate decision to work with a different kind of client. As an example, I recently started translating blog posts for a European environmental foundation. When I did the sample translation for them, they said, “Don’t treat it as a legal translation; rewrite it the way an American blog post should sound.” That’s the kind of client I’m looking for, because that’s a skill that MT doesn’t have.

If you want a comparison with another industry, I’d think in terms of the effect of tax preparation software on independent accountants and small accounting firms. Just like MT can give me a reasonable approximation of the menu at my favorite pizzeria in Milan, TurboTax and its ilk can do a decent job of preparing a simple tax return. I would assume that tax preparation software has taken a chunk out of the lower end of the accounting market, i.e. people who would otherwise use a chain, storefront accounting service. But, as someone who spends about $1,000 a year on accounting for my freelance business, I would never, in a million years, dump my accountant for TurboTax. I think of my accountant as the CFO of my business; she can advise me on whether to shunt more money into my retirement account or spend it on upgrading my computer system, or whether I’m missing any hidden deductions, or what I should do when I unexpectedly make more or less money in a quarter than I thought I would. As an example, here’s a story by a writer who pitted TurboTax against her human accountant and stuck with the human. Just as MT cannot tell a client whether US readers would know where Fribourg is (no, say “Fribourg, Switzerland”), or whether “their” is preferable to “his/her” (less clunky but may be too casual for formal writing; see Chicago Manual of Style for workarounds), TurboTax isn’t going to be your CFO.

In sum, I don’t think it’s a question of whether the translation industry will still be here in 20 years; I feel confident that it will. I think the larger and more important question is where you want to fit in: translating and/or post-editing huge volumes of words a day, or working as more of a bilingual writer. Readers, over to you: thoughts on this?


Corinne McKay

Become a tablet translator: guest post by Alexander Drechsel

This is a guest post by Alexander Drechsel. Alexander is a staff interpreter at the European Commission, who works from English, French, and Romanian into his native German. He shares other people’s opinions in the interpreting booth, and his own thoughts and insights on languages and technology on his website adrechsel.de or as @adrechsel on Twitter. You can also tune in to LangFM, his storytelling podcast about language and what people do with it, and Troublesome Terps, a conversational podcast about topics that keep interpreters up at night, with Jonathan Downie and Alexander Gansmeier.

Tablet with interpreter microphone

Sometimes, when people talk to me at a conference or meet-up, they’ll just address me as the “tablet guy” or the “tablet interpreter.” This is probably because I have been working with tablets ever since Apple launched its first iPad in 2010. At last count, I have owned five versions of the iPad and three Android tablets. All of those I have used before, during, and after interpreting assignments for all kinds of tasks. And for several years, I have helped fellow interpreters get the most out of their tablet during workshops and presentations.
In the back of my mind, however, there has always been the question: What about tablets and translation? Can these devices be useful for translators? In this article, I will explore the question in more detail.

The CAT-shaped elephant in the room

The easy way to dismiss tablets as work devices for translators is to check whether CAT tools run on them. But in 2017, the answer is not a simple “no,” but rather: it depends. First of all, why aren’t CAT tools widely available on mobile devices? Well, between translation memory, machine translation, terminology, project management and other features, a CAT tool can be a real application heavyweight. But mobile apps tend to be more focused: doing a few things, or just one thing well instead of providing lots of functionality. Let’s take a look at the current situation of CAT tools with regard to tablets:

– SDL Trados Studio is not currently available on tablets. You could certainly install it on a Microsoft Surface Pro 4, but that is more of a tablet-laptop hybrid. So for now, your only option to use it on a “real” tablet, would be remote access (see below).
– OmegaT is a CAT tool that requires the Java runtime environment to work but Java is not (really) available on iOS or Android tablets. (Again, the Microsoft Surface would be an alternative).
– MemoQ: While Kilgray do offer MemoQWeb, you need a memoQ server installation along with web licences to be able to use it. If you do, you get the translation interface, a collaborative terminology management system and some project management and administration features.
– Wordfast also provides a web-based solution, called Wordfast Anywhere, and it does not even require a Wordfast licence. Free of charge (for now), it gives you a personal workspace on the company’s server for your translation memories, glossaries and other files. WFA also offers collaboration and sharing features.
– Memsource appears to be the leading CAT tool right now when it comes to mobile availability. For starters, it is designed as a cloud-based solution. A desktop editing software is available, but most of the heavy lifting happens online. The recently published apps for iOS and Android are mainly intended for project managers.

Now, while some CAT tools can indeed be used on tablets, the biggest problem is likely to be the limited screen real estate available. My advice would be to use an external keyboard. On Android and Windows devices, you can even connect a mouse.

Getting down to business. And productivity.

With the CAT-sized elephant out of the way, let’s look at some more work-related use-cases. As a matter of fact, most productivity tasks can now easily be carried out with tablets. With office suites from Microsoft, Google and Apple readily available, you can:

– Write and edit text documents. Most applications also support track changes or will even let you draw and doodle on a text.
– Draw up and edit spreadsheets. Yes, they can even contain formulas or conditional formatting, if need be.
– Create and edit presentations. Oh, and did you know you can also give the presentation straight from your device? Wirelessly?

Another obvious use case is managing email. And no need to only do triage – with a little bit of practice on the on-screen keyboard (or, well, an external keyboard), you’ll be writing on the go like a pro in no time. And with tricks like email snoozing, mobile email clients like Airmail or Spark easily out-smart their desktop counterparts.

And yes, in some regards, our mobile companions are real geniuses: Think of the camera in your tablet or smartphone. You cannot only use it for snapshots, but also to turn your device into a smart portable scanner. Apps like Scanbot leverage the device camera to help you scan one or several pages quickly and cleanly, and even offer optical character recognition. And with FreshBooks, you can not only manage clients, projects and invoices, but also “scan” paper receipts that you may need for billing a client.

More than a remote possibility: accessing your home computer

Whether you’re travelling around the globe or are just one floor away from your desk: sometimes it can be handy to be able to access the home computer remotely. Maybe it’s that big old CAT tool that does not run on mobile devices or a file you have placed on the desktop, but not in your favorite cloud storage – once you’ve set up remote access, these moments will not scare you anymore (unless you’ve turned your computer off). And it’s actually quite easy to get started. There are two components to the setup, a “helper app” on your PC and the client app on your tablet or smartphone. The easiest system I know of is Google Remote Desktop, especially if you’re already using the Chrome desktop browser:

1. Install the Chrome Remote Desktop extension on your Mac or PC.
2. Open the newly installed Remote Desktop app and follow the setup instructions.
3. Download the client app for your iOS or Android device and sign in with your Google credentials.
4. Choose your PC or Mac from the list of available devices and log in with the PIN you entered during setup.

Double take: second screen

Image source: Duet Display
Image source: Duet Display

This may sound a little silly at first, but bear with me. With “second screen,” I’m not referring to hanging out on your favorite social network and commenting on a TV show or the game that everybody’s watching right now. Instead, it’s the use of apps to extend your main computer screen to your tablet. It works similarly to remote access: you install the helper app on your computer and the mobile app on your tablet, make sure that both devices are directly connected or on the same network and you’re good to go. If you’re curious, iDisplay is a good place to start, since it’s available for all major platforms. The luxury option for iPad users with a Mac or PC is Duet Display. But even without such an app, you can just use the tablet as a secondary device next to your main computer, say, for research, to control the music that “gets you into the zone” for that dreaded patent translation or as reference when you are localizing an app.

Lastly…

Steve Jobs, the late Apple co-founder, once used a great analogyto describe computers and tablets:

“When we were an agrarian nation, all cars were trucks, because that’s what you needed on the farm. But as vehicles started to be used in the urban centers, cars got more popular. Innovations like automatic transmission and power steering and things that you didn’t care about in a truck as much started to become paramount in cars. … PCs are going to be like trucks. They’re still going to be around, they’re still going to have a lot of value, but they’re going to be used by one out of X people.”

So when PCs are trucks and tablets are cars, maybe Microsoft’s Surface devices are SUVs? Whatever you compare them to, tablets have become mature devices that can be useful for translators, too. Why don’t you give it a try? And if you just want to grab your tablet to “Netflix and chill” – go ahead, we won’t judge you!


Corinne McKay

Marketing to Direct Clients: starts Monday

My online course Marketing to Direct Clients starts Monday, and I still have a couple of spots left. It’s a four-week online session that includes online videos, eight live question and answer sessions (recordings provided if you can’t attend), and individual feedback on four homework assignments. You’ll finish the course with a doable plan for finding and marketing to direct clients.

A recent participant in one of my courses commented, “The course was fantastic, full of lots of interesting materials and useful tips and tricks on how to move forward with our businesses. I was particularly struck with how generous Corinne is with her time and how she makes herself available on conference calls, inviting questions to answer and debating business issues with fellow translators.”

Registration for Marketing to Direct Clients is $380, with a $15 discount for ATA members (use code ATA at checkout), and a $15 discount for anyone who’s taken a previous course with me (use code ALUM at checkout). I hope to see some of you there!