For the Translators - Are you killing your future opportunities?

[siddgives]

Hi Frnds,

I’m Sidd and This topic is only for the translators like myself… I hope most of you got orders that says " I don’t need Google Translation." Buyers always at first try to get there work done through such translation engines and soon after they realise that no software can do a man’s work… so they come to us… But haven’t we ever took help from those engines??? Haven’t we ever thought that those should be more useful??

HOLD ON!!! If those get smarter and do the translation correctly, who’ll need us, Translators???

The Google Translator has initiated a campaign where they are asking users to contribute with various forms of translation for all the languages. and in return you will get virtual medals and ranking and all sort of non professional $**ts.

Also wordpress has launched the same type translation feature as free plugin and even some of you have got the same order request over here on fiverr… i got one…

SO WHATS THE POINT??
As a Translator I feel really sad when i calculate that, we worked hard through out our life to reach the skill for the service we are providing to the buyers for as low as $5 and then some billionaire company puts it for charity and tries to raise their bank balance, eventually kicking us out of our small market… All this using our works only…

Deference of working Area…

I’m not saying it is not right to work for some PC or Android Dictionary… but if they get the work done by the GTranslator for free will they car to come to us??? I might sound a bit selfish but its better than getting no hits on our gigs…

The Request!!!

I have decided to stay put for such offers that will utilize us to throw ourselves out of the industry… i’d like to hear your thoughts coz i may be missing some points or there could be some other POV for this issue… But if you agree with me Please do not kill your future for a few dimes or recognitions today…

Good Luck

[Guest shadowfire22]

I feel I would want GT to represent my language accurately. I know this may result in less money, but it does more harm than good if people can’t trust a computer translator. Though, I don’t care how good a translator a computer becomes, I feel people will always be needed to understand idioms and cultural references. So I think your buying crowd will decrease, but not diminish completely. I hope you still have many buyers in the future and may need to start an additional gig. Take care.

[Guest ezinearticles4u]

The same thing is BTW happening in the field of photography (and other creative fields). But then again, isn’t Fiverr built on the concept of crowdsourcing as well?
What a creative individual must do, is to somehow differentiate herself, and refuse to contribute her work to someone else’s crowdsourcing efforts.
Getting paid, NOT exploited!

[mariokluser]

I agree with toutou123. I offer translation gigs because I can not because I love them. I don’t do translations only via Fivver, though my gigs are exclusively on Fiverr.
My buyers on Fiverr and the external ones want the quality these engines can’t provide. If they would chose for crap quality, it’s their problem. Not mine. In life you have to reinvent yourself very often. Getting into the role of the victim of technology doesn’t bring you anywhere. If the translation business would ‘die’ I wouldn’t hesitate to do something else.
I also have a photo studio and work as (well educated) photographer and high-end-retoucher. (This is nothing you can offer for 5 bucks b.t.w). I don’t do shoots with and for people who don’t even know what a good photograph is. If they want crap they can go to any of the shoot-and-burners in the area. No hard feelings. There are people who come to me for a reason and they are willing to safe money in order to afford it. Just recently I turned a wedding down as the client told me she wanted some standard wedding photo’s. I sent her to a standard photographer.

[fonthaunt]

I entirely agree with @toutou123 and @mariokluser. I don’t offer translation services although I could, but if I did, mine would be worse than Google translate. However, if I needed a translation done, I would choose based on the type of need I have. If I only need to know if someone using Spanish wrote something against the rules in the forum, Google will typically work fine. If I was going to publish one of my own blog posts in Spanish, I can’t translate well enough and I wouldn’t want the quality of software, so I’d hire someone. Translation is not going to disappear fast and someone trying to win a prize isn’t going to hurt it.

In the long run, though, as mario said, you have to reinvent yourself routinely. My spouse used to work for the biggest pager company in the United States. The company refused to move into mobile phones because they firmly believed their market would remain strong enough to sustain them. They gambled wrong. Yes, some doctors and a few other pros need pagers because they are technically still more reliable than mobile phone service and because they make good cheap backup devices. The market isn’t big enough to sustain an entire company anymore and the one I’m talking about here went bankrupt. Things change and we have to change too.