Crowdsource translation is surprisingly useful for products with large and highly-engaged users, but it is not about simply showing your phrases to the users and asking for help. You have to consider the factors such as the turnaround time, the quality as well as any potential trolls. It is not an one-off process, but an on-going one along with your product’s growth. 1. Get the phrases translated One of the myths about crowdsource translation is to save cost by involving loyal

Agile localization: myth or reality? I think many of those who are working in translation industry already got used to small chunks of work that need to be translated within short turnaround time. And buzzword “Agile” emerged as one of popular tendencies. What does it mean in terms of localization? What is Agile? Agile is development practice and methodology that focuses on frequent delivery of working software, continues changes, tight collaboration between team members. In agile, there are two-week sprints,

When companies are planning to roll out a new product, localization can be a surprisingly low priority on their to-do list. Why? Because most of the time, there is almost no localization related discussion until the later stages of the development process. That’s why localization requirements will usually be assigned a lower priority and when the project gets hectic, those requirements will likely be omitted altogether. Even though the importance of localization and translation have been proven time and time again, there are

Nowadays context is king, especially if we talk about localization of apps, software, games, websites and web services. The more context translator has, the more accurate translation will be. Often translator has to work with source strings extracted in the CAT-tool only with no or little context. Fortunately, more and more localization PMs and product managers, that are responsible for translation and localization, understand the importance of context. So in what ways can they provide more contexts and give a

Marketing and Localization  Localization is a complex process involving many stakeholders in the company: developers, testers, product team, marketing team (often in-country), of course localization and internationalization team, including localization project manager(s), in-house/freelancers and editors etc. In trying to maintain a single, focused message globally, in-house marketing team often steps in during the process of final quality review, setting up/changing translation of core terminology, and organizing in-country events. Different companies have different models of marketing team involvement. Some, like Adobe,

Many US companies still don’t really think about the language of their content, which means there are big opportunities for the companies that do. Because English has been so influential around the world, content used to be rolled out around the world without localization. That fact is changing rapidly as consumers are beginning to demand more relevant content. English is considered the world’s most influential language by far, based on criteria such as number of secondary speakers, economic power of

Star Trek‘s futuristic technologies has long been a source of inspiration for scientists and engineers, who hope to turn science fiction into reality. Although no one has invented a transporter yet, some of its technologies, like the classic universal translator, is less far-fetched than you might think. Imagine a tiny device that could remove language barriers and let you communicate with anyone who speaks a different language that you don’t understand. This is what a true universal translator is supposed

Twitter is definitely one of our best friends to stay connected with our networks and keep abreast of the latest trends on topics we are interested in. Localization might seems a niche topic at first glance, but there are still lots of gems on twitter that can “tweet” you inspirations everyday. Here we have prepared a quick list of industry insiders, from thought leaders, insightful good-read channels to translator community. No matter if you are newbie or experienced practitioners, get