| Pages in topic: [1 2 3] > | Does the old translation industry still exist or has MT and outsourcing taken over? Thread poster: Matthew Held
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Matthew Held 
United States
Local time: 03:15
German to English
Hello fellow translators, I have translated German > English professionally for over 20 years. For the past ten years I am part time. I currently accept jobs from about a half dozen agencies in Europe. For the past few years I receive very few "normal-sized" jobs (couple hundred euros or more). Mostly I receive inquiries for very small jobs (20 euros or less) and many of those are to edit machine translations or verify 100% matches of mediocre or dubious quality (translations done in Asia, I sus... See more Hello fellow translators, I have translated German > English professionally for over 20 years. For the past ten years I am part time. I currently accept jobs from about a half dozen agencies in Europe. For the past few years I receive very few "normal-sized" jobs (couple hundred euros or more). Mostly I receive inquiries for very small jobs (20 euros or less) and many of those are to edit machine translations or verify 100% matches of mediocre or dubious quality (translations done in Asia, I suspect).
My question: Have MT and outsourcing taken over the translation industry? Does anyone get substantial jobs of 500 or 1000 USD/Euros? Have prices taken a nosedive as a result of such trends?
I am considering rekindling relationships or reaching out to agencies in Germany, but I'm not sure if it's worth the effort. It's possible that my view of the industry is skewed because I have not actively promoted myself for several years.
I would like to know what others are experiencing. Thanks.
Matt Held
mh-transconsult.com ▲ Collapse
| | | | Lieven Malaise
Belgium
Local time: 09:15
Member (2020)
French to Dutch
+ ...
I think there's a clear shift towards more machine translation editing, but I still get substantial jobs (tens of thousands of words) on a regular basis, even in conventional translation.
I have no hard data to substantiate my claim (I obviously only have my own experience), but I wouldn't be surprised if MT is (slowly) taking over at the expense of conventional translation. Only yesterday one of my long-standing clients asked me for the very first time if I would be available for a... See more I think there's a clear shift towards more machine translation editing, but I still get substantial jobs (tens of thousands of words) on a regular basis, even in conventional translation.
I have no hard data to substantiate my claim (I obviously only have my own experience), but I wouldn't be surprised if MT is (slowly) taking over at the expense of conventional translation. Only yesterday one of my long-standing clients asked me for the very first time if I would be available for an MTPE project. She wasn't the first one, but the next in the row. I expect the majority of my other clients wil follow in the coming months or years.
I would recommend all translators who have an interest in staying a translator as long as possible to join the Dark Side now, not tomorrow. I've been training myself in MTPE for 3 years now and it really pays off. But don't expect to become good at it (meaning being fast enough to compensate for a 30%-40% rate decrease, while delivering high quality) after only a few tries. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Lingua 5B
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Local time: 09:15
Member (2009)
English to Croatian
+ ...
How does one “train themselves in MTPE”? What is there to train about?
| | | | Baran Keki
Türkiye
Local time: 10:15
Member
English to Turkish
| Not yet I spuppose | Nov 7, 2023 |
A cursory search of these forums will inform you that the thing called ChatGPT is the source of all evil. People here seem to be positively obsessed with it. Not a day goes by where you don't see a thread calling for the removal of ChatGPT from something or another. But what is surprising is that it's more or less the same people (who declare ChatGPT as the evil incarnate) that heap praises on DeepL, take it more or less granted and justify its existence, which, in my opinion, is the real threat... See more A cursory search of these forums will inform you that the thing called ChatGPT is the source of all evil. People here seem to be positively obsessed with it. Not a day goes by where you don't see a thread calling for the removal of ChatGPT from something or another. But what is surprising is that it's more or less the same people (who declare ChatGPT as the evil incarnate) that heap praises on DeepL, take it more or less granted and justify its existence, which, in my opinion, is the real threat to their very profession and livelihood as it, at the very least, empowers the incompetent, mediocre, bottom-feeder type human translator, turning them into passable, halfway decent translators. It's those human translators, not MT or the hated ChatGPT, that cause the rates to go down. That also probably explains why you see mediocre, dubious quality translations from a certain part of the world (I'm a recovering PC person, I'm not allowed to make geographical or demographic references that might upset some people).
As for your question, there are still decent paying agencies out there. It's just a matter of investing time and effort into finding them. I've been freelancing for more than 6 years now. I've never been interested in PMTE, and I still don't know how it works rate-wise. If I can do it, I can't see why you couldn't in a more popular language pair. ▲ Collapse
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Tony Keily
Local time: 09:15
Italian to English
+ ...
| You're not wrong | Nov 7, 2023 |
Hi Matt,
I work with agencies in the UK and Italy. In recent years what I've noticed is a drop in the overall volume of work offered and a drop in the number of intermediate-sized jobs (5,000-10,000 words).
Because previously I was only able to take about a third of the work offered me, the drop in the volume of work offered hadn't really affected the volume of work I take until this year.
I've continued to receive large and even very large jobs in recent ... See more Hi Matt,
I work with agencies in the UK and Italy. In recent years what I've noticed is a drop in the overall volume of work offered and a drop in the number of intermediate-sized jobs (5,000-10,000 words).
Because previously I was only able to take about a third of the work offered me, the drop in the volume of work offered hadn't really affected the volume of work I take until this year.
I've continued to receive large and even very large jobs in recent years (10,000-50,000+ words). But I often got the impression that these jobs were saving my year, because I was no longer turning down lots of medium-sized jobs while involved in these big projects.
So the scenario for me has been in some ways similar to you: less offer, most jobs offered small (and often in weird, non machine-readable formats) and a lack of jobs in the 5,000-10,000 word range. But to date saved by the odd big project.
On MTPE, I've taken one or two jobs and just treat them as revision/retranslation jobs. I insist of having a look first, look at the price and decide whether it's worth my while.
Hope that helps! ▲ Collapse
| | | | Lieven Malaise
Belgium
Local time: 09:15
Member (2020)
French to Dutch
+ ...
Lingua 5B wrote:
How does one “train themselves in MTPE”? What is there to train about?
It is difficult to explain if you don't experience it yourself, but it is somewhat comparable to the learning process of translation. You need talent to be a good translator, but besides talent there is a wide margin in which a talented translator can improve his skills and increase his translation speed by doing it over and over again. It is somewhat the same with post-editing. It's a real struggle at first, but the more you do it the more you begin to understand how you have to proceed to make it really work and the 'easier' it gets.
| | | | Lieven Malaise
Belgium
Local time: 09:15
Member (2020)
French to Dutch
+ ...
Baran Keki wrote:
But what is surprising is that it's more or less the same people (who declare ChatGPT as the evil incarnate) that heap praises on DeepL
The reason is quite simple : you can't compare machine translation engines to ChatGPT translation. Machine translation engines are basically ChatGPT, but on a leash. And that leash makes all the difference (for now).
| | | | Baran Keki
Türkiye
Local time: 10:15
Member
English to Turkish
| You may be right | Nov 7, 2023 |
Lieven Malaise wrote:
The reason is quite simple : you can't compare machine translation engines to ChatGPT translation. Machine translation engines are basically ChatGPT, but on a leash. And that leash makes all the difference (for now).
But that wasn't the point I was making.
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Tom in London
United Kingdom
Local time: 08:15
Member (2008)
Italian to English
Matthew Held wrote:
I would like to know what others are experiencing. Thanks.
Matt Held
mh-transconsult.com
It depends on the language pair.
Clearly, if Lieven Malaise's experience is to be believed, there is a big demand for translating very big documents into Dutch.
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I have been translating for over 40 years and the road has always been bumpy, but here I am still moving forward…
| | | | Lieven Malaise
Belgium
Local time: 09:15
Member (2020)
French to Dutch
+ ...
Tom in London wrote:
Clearly, if Lieven Malaise's experience is to be believed, there is a big demand for translating very big documents into Dutch.
Only into Dutch ? Yesterday I received a website post-editing proposal of over 150.000 words. The diversity of big documents is impressive. What makes you believe that those are only needed in a select number of languages ?
| | | | Tom in London
United Kingdom
Local time: 08:15
Member (2008)
Italian to English
| You only translate into Dutch | Nov 7, 2023 |
Lieven Malaise wrote:
Only into Dutch ? Yesterday I received a website post-editing proposal of over 150.000 words. The diversity of big documents is impressive. What makes you believe that those are only needed in a select number of languages ?
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Lieven Malaise
Belgium
Local time: 09:15
Member (2020)
French to Dutch
+ ...
... of the fact that I only translate into Dutch (surprise, surprise). My question is why you believe that Dutch would be somewhat special if we are talking about the amount or different types of big documents.
| | | | Lingua 5B
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Local time: 09:15
Member (2009)
English to Croatian
+ ...
Lieven Malaise wrote:
... of the fact that I only translate into Dutch (surprise, surprise). My question is why you believe that Dutch would be somewhat special if we are talking about the amount or different types of big documents.
While the demand in Dutch may not be super high, the supply is rather low. You don’t have many competitors. Source: I worked as a project manager.
| | | | Lingua 5B
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Local time: 09:15
Member (2009)
English to Croatian
+ ...
| No, not translation | Nov 7, 2023 |
Lieven Malaise wrote: Lingua 5B wrote:
How does one “train themselves in MTPE”? What is there to train about? It is difficult to explain if you don't experience it yourself, but it is somewhat comparable to the learning process of translation. You need talent to be a good translator, but besides talent there is a wide margin in which a talented translator can improve his skills and increase his translation speed by doing it over and over again. It is somewhat the same with post-editing. It's a real struggle at first, but the more you do it the more you begin to understand how you have to proceed to make it really work and the 'easier' it gets.
It’s more like proofreading, not translation.
It can’t be trained when each text is a separate entitity for itself. I may perceive this wrongly, but you make it sound like it’s nuclear physics. The process is not difficult, it’s tedious. There’s a difference.
It’s like grading (bad) students’ papers. When I was a student, all the teachers at the Uni ran away from grading papers like a plague (because it’s time consuming and tedious). Those who would accept it, it would take 6 months for them to get the papers back. Yes, they are trained, nothing to do with training.
[Edited at 2023-11-07 12:03 GMT]
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