How about training language experts in academic institutions on how to
translate contents from one language Wikipedia (Eg. English wikipedia) to
another? I believe this would be more productive than paying people
directly to contribute or translate contents.
Sometimes in 2016, I discussed with a professor of Yoruba language and Head
of Department of Yoruba language on possible collaboration between the
department and the Yoruba Wikipedia community. We agreed that students
could be assigned to translating high quality articles from the English
Wikipedia to Yoruba Wikipedia and they could be doing these translations as
part of their course work in Yoruba language.
In Nigerian universities for example, Yoruba students take "Àyan Ògbùfò
(the principle of translation) " as part of a course(s) they must pass to
be awarded a degree in Yoruba language.
We could take advantage of this and approach them on possible collaboration.
Today, I had about 30 minutes discussion with one of the contributors to
the Yoruba language version
<https://www.jw.org/yo/awon-itejade/%C3%A0w%E1%BB%8Dn-%C3%ACw%C3%A9-%C3%ACr%C3%B2y%C3%ACn/>
of The watchtower and awake! magazine.
<https://www.jw.org/en/publications/magazines/>
on possible collaboration. He was excited and agreed to be fully involved.
There are institutions and individuals that would be interested in
translating high quality contents, we just need to reach out to them and
devise a means to get them fully involved.
Regards,
Isaac
On Sat, Feb 24, 2018 at 4:04 PM, James Heilman <jmh649(a)gmail.com> wrote:
I agree with John that it is very difficult to turn a
translator into a new
editor. I also agree with Jean-Philippe that it is key to have involvement
of the local projects and preferable if they lead the efforts. Of the
languages we worked in only one explicitly requested not to be involved /
have translations from TWB.
James
On Sat, Feb 24, 2018 at 7:59 AM, John Erling Blad <jeblad(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
You can turn it around; give added credits for
translations from small
language projects and into the larger ones, that is a lot more
interesting
than strictly translating from the larger
language projects.
On Sat, Feb 24, 2018 at 3:55 PM, Jean-Philippe Béland <
jpbeland(a)wikimedia.ca
wrote:
I think the request for such projects should come
from the concerned
language projects, same for the list of articles. If not, in my simple
opinion, it is a form of coloniasm again.
Jean-Philippe Béland
Vice President, Wikimedia Canada
On Sat, Feb 24, 2018 at 9:40 AM John Erling Blad <jeblad(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
> Should have added that the remaining points are somewhat less
interesting
> in this context. Preloading a set of
articles is a bad idea, the
> translators should be able to chose for themselves. Articles should
also
be
> pretty broad, not very narrow technical or medical, ie vertical
articles,
> > as the number of editors that can handle those will be pretty small.
> >
> > In particular: Do not believe you can turn a teanslator into a new
> editor!
> > You can although turn an existing editor into a translator.
> >
> > On Sat, Feb 24, 2018 at 3:34 PM, John Erling Blad <jeblad(a)gmail.com>
>
wrote:
> >
> > > 1) You must start with high quality content and thus all articles
are
> > >> extensively improved before
being proposed for translation.
> > >
> > >
> > > Note that to much pressure on "quality" can easily kill the
project.
> > >
> > > 3) The "Content Translation" tool developed by the WMF made
efforts
> more
> > >> efficient than handing around word documents. Would love to see
that
>
tool
> >> improved further such as having it support specific lists of
articles
> > that
> > >> are deemed ready for translation by certain groups. Would also
love
the
> >> tool to have tracking metrics for these types of projects.
> >
> >
> > Didn't mention ContentTranslation, but it should be pretty obvious.
> >
> > 4) We used volunteer translators mostly associated with our partner
> >> Translators Without Borders. One issue we found was that languages
in
>>
which
>> their are lots of translators such as French, Spanish, and Italian
there
> >> is
> >> often already at least some content on many of the topics in
question.
> > The
> > >> issue than becomes integration which needs an expert Wikipedia.
And
for
>> languages in which we have little
content there are often few
avaliable
> >> volunteers.
> >
> >
> > I used projects below 65k articles as an example, as the chance of
> > competing articles are pretty low.
> >
> > 5) With respect to "paying per word" the problem is this would
require
>>
significant checks and balances to make sure people are taking the
work
> >> seriously and not simple using Google translate for the 70 or so
> languages
> >> in which it claims to work. We often had translations undergo a
second
> > >> review and the volunteers at TWB have to pass certain tests to be
> > >> accepted.
> > >
> > >
> > > I'n my original email I wrote "verified good translators".
It is as
> > > simple as "Has the editor contributed other articles at the
project?"
> > >
> > > On Sat, Feb 24, 2018 at 2:26 PM, James Heilman <jmh649(a)gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > >
> > >> We learned a few things during the medical translation project
which
>
>> started back in 2011:
> >>
> >> 1) You must start with high quality content and thus all articles
are
> > >> extensively improved before being proposed for translation.
> > >>
> > >> 2) A lot of languages want "less" content than is present on
EN
WP.
> Thus
> > >> we
> > >> moved to just improving and suggesting for translation the leads
of
> the
> > >> English articles.
> > >>
> > >> 3) The "Content Translation" tool developed by the WMF made
efforts
> more
> > >> efficient than handing around word documents. Would love to see
that
>
tool
> >> improved further such as having it support specific lists of
articles
> > that
> > >> are deemed ready for translation by certain groups. Would also
love
> the
> > >> tool to have tracking metrics for these types of projects.
> > >>
> > >> 4) We used volunteer translators mostly associated with our
partner
>
>> Translators Without Borders. One issue we found was that languages
in
>>
which
>> their are lots of translators such as French, Spanish, and Italian
there
> >> is
> >> often already at least some content on many of the topics in
question.
> > The
> > >> issue than becomes integration which needs an expert Wikipedia.
And
for
>> languages in which we have little
content there are often few
avaliable
> >> volunteers.
> >>
> >> 5) With respect to "paying per word" the problem is this would
require
>>
significant checks and balances to make sure people are taking the
work
> >> seriously and not simple using Google translate for the 70 or so
> languages
> >> in which it claims to work. We often had translations undergo a
second
> > >> review and the volunteers at TWB have to pass certain tests to be
> > >> accepted.
> > >>
> > >> 6) I hired a coordinator for the translation project for a couple
of
>
>> years.
> >> The translators at TWB did not want to become Wikipedians or learn
how
> to
> >> use our systems. The coordinator created account like TransSW001
(one
for
>> each volunteer) and preloaded the article to be translated into
Content
> >> Translation. They than gave the volunteer translator the user name
and
> > >> password to the account.
> > >>
> > >> 7) Were are we at now? There are currently just over 1,000 leads
of
> > >> articles that have been
improved and are ready for translation.
This
>
>> includes articles on the 440 medications that are on the WHO
Essential
> >> List. We have worked a bit in some
100 languages. The efforts have
> >> resulted
> >> in more than 5 million works translated and integrated into
different
> >> Wikipedias. The coordinator has
unfortunately moved on to his real
job
> of
> >> teaching high school students.
> >>
> >> 8) The project continues but at a slower pace than before. The
> Wikipedian
> >> and retired orthopedic surgeon Subas Chandra Rout has basically
single
> >> handedly translated nearly all
1,000 leads into Odia a language
spoken
> by
> >> 40 million people in Eastern India. The amazing thing is that for
many
> > of
> > >> these topics this is the first and only information online about
it.
>> Google
>> translate does not even claim to work in this language. Our
partnerships
> >> with WMTW and medical school in Taipai continue to translate into
> Chinese.
> >> There the students translate and than their translations are
reviewed
> by
> > >> their profs before being posted. They translate in groups using
> hackpad
> > to
> > >> make it more social.
> > >>
> > >> I am currently working to re invigorate the project :-)
> > >> James
> > >>
> > >> On Sat, Feb 24, 2018 at 5:51 AM, John Erling Blad <
jeblad(a)gmail.com
>> wrote:
>>
>> > This discussion is going to be fun! =D
>> >
>> > A little more than seventy Wikipedia-projects has more than 65k
>> articles,
>> > the remaining two hundred or so are pretty small.
>> >
>> > What if a base set of articles were opened for paid translators?
There
> >> are
> >> > several lists of such base sets. We have both the thousand
articles
> > from
> > >> > "List of articles every Wikipedia should have"[1] and
and the
ten
>
>> thousand
> >> > articles from the expanded list[2].
> >> >
> >> > Lets say verified good translators was paid about $0.01 per word
> (about
> >> $1
> >> > for a 1k-article) for translating one of those articles into
another
> > >> > language, with perhaps a higher pay for contributors in
high-cost
> > >> > countries. The pay would
also have to be higher for languages
that
>
lacks
> >> > good translation tools.
> >> >
> >> > I believe this would be an _enabling_ activity for the
communities,
as
> >> > without a base set of articles it won't be possible to build a
> >> community at
> >> > all. By not paying for new articles, and only translating
> >> well-referenced
> >> > articles, some of the disputes in the communities could be
avoided.
> >> Perhaps
> >> > we should also identify good source articles, that would be a
help.
> >> > Translated articles should be
above some minimum size, but they
does
> > not
> > >> > have to be full translations of the source article.
> > >> >
> > >> > A real problem is that our existing lists of good articles other
> > >> projects
> > >> > should have is pretty much biased towards Western World, so they
> need
> > a
> > >> lot
> > >> > of adjustments. Perhaps such a project would identify our
inherit
bias?
>> >
>> > [1]
>> >
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/List_of_articles_every_
>> > Wikipedia_should_have
>> > [2]
>> >
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/List_of_articles_every_
>> > Wikipedia_should_have/Expanded
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>> --
>> James Heilman
>> MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian
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