I wrote about the Meedan Project just a few weeks ago. The site has been launched, and although the translations are not brilliant, they are readable and make sense.
Meedan had originally planned to use the Worldwide Lexicon (WWL) project's open source system, but right now we're using IBM's Machine Translation engine and the IBM Transbrowser" -- a browser-based tool for creating a translation layer on the web.
Meedan's data -- its 'translation memory' of over 3m words -- is available to other translators. George Weyman, Meedan's content and community manager, says: "the translations that are done with the Transbrowser are part of our agreement with IBM that makes sure all those translations are open source."
The 'translation memory' is important because having a corpus of texts in two languages allows you to apply statistical techniques to improve a translation engine. The whole translation memory is downloadable from http://github.com/anastaw/Meedan-Memory.
For all your English to Arabic and vice versa translations that will help you expand your business into the Middle East visit Arabic Language Experts at http://www.arabic.com.au/
Showing posts with label media. Show all posts
Showing posts with label media. Show all posts
Sunday, April 04, 2010
Wednesday, March 03, 2010
Meedan Bridges Language, Culture
From Robert Lukes, Dakota
A new website was launched last month with the intention of providing a means of communication between the Arabic- and English-speaking worlds. Meedan, the Arabic word for "gathering place" or "town square," is meant to symbolize the old town squares where people would gather together and discuss community issues.
Arabic-language websites have been fairly unrepresented in the internet, but this is set to change in the near future. Vinton Cerf, a vice president at Google, estimated that the number of Arabic-speaking internet users in the Middle East will increase by 46.4 percent in the next three years, creating a great opportunity for increased communication between people across the planet.
The method for this breakthrough is a computer translation program that translates articles, blogs, and comments into the language of the reader. This automated translation is augmented by a team of experts and reader contributions-not unlike Wikipedia-to fix any inaccuracies in the computer translation.
In this way, Meedan intends to break through the familiar narrative of conflict between peoples. Through creating an online community, the people behind Meedan hope to bring the people into direct communication with each other. Much has been said about the gap in understanding between the English-speaking world and the so-called 'Arab street.'
More information, can be found at news.meedan.net.
I just hope they don't start some war by using translation software for this praiseworthy project.
For all your English to Arabic and vice versa translations that will help you expand your business into the Middle East visit Arabic Language Experts at http://www.arabic.com.au/.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Advertising in Arabic-speaking Media? Read This!
From The National (UAE)
by Hassan Hassan
ABU DHABI // Arabic-language online media outlets are burgeoning, but still have little advertising revenue compared with their print counterparts, says a report by the Emirates Centre for Strategic Studies and Research (ECSSR).
The report, published in the latest issue of the centre’s Future Horizons magazine, argued that Arabic-language print media lacked quality, but continued to thrive because advertising buyers had not been persuaded of the value of online ads.
Most print media persisted because in addition to advertising, many publications also received funding from individuals, businesses or governments, it said.
If advertising buyers turned to online media, print media would be in “great danger”.
“Print media is suffering a crisis with their readers for failing to adapt to the constant developments,” said Othman al Umair, the owner of Elaph, one of the first Arabic-language electronic newspapers, which was established in May 2001.
Mr al Umair said the print sector was “trying hard to produce good-looking papers, yet with [poor-quality] news or information, while [electronic media] is succeeding in bringing high-quality news and information directly to the reader”.
The Arab Media Outlook from the Dubai Press Club and the consultancy PricewaterhouseCoopers said that internet advertising revenue in the UAE was expected to grow by 9 per cent a year between 2006 and 2012, while advertising was expected to grow 13 per cent a year at magazines and 16 per cent a year for newspapers in the Emirates.
Online advertising in the Middle East comprised less than 1 per cent of total advertising spending in 2007, the outlook said. In the UAE, print media accounted for 88 per cent of total advertising spending in 2007.
The ECSSR report noted that the continued publication of some Arabic-language newspapers was not an indication of their profitability. When an Arabic-language newspaper stopped publishing, it said, it often did so for political reasons rather than financial ones.
Ghassan Habbal, a researcher at the ECSSR and one of the authors of the report, offered the example of Al Safir, a Lebanese newspaper. The paper’s peak sales are about 10,000 copies, but it attracts about four times the advertising revenue of a website with more than 50,000 readers.
In general, a high-traffic website can expect to recoup about 2 per cent of its costs through advertising, the report said.
Muaffaq Harb, a media expert, said the value of the internet for the advertising community was demographics. Websites can easily collect data on readers, which are valuable for advertisers who want to make sure that their messages reach a specific group.
“Advertising is a decisive factor that would make up for the lack of subscription fees,” he said. “Fees are necessary for specialised websites and newspapers, not the general ones.”
Mr al Umair said the challenges to print media included a greater tolerance for free speech online compared to print.
Mr Harb agreed that the future of electronic media versus print depended on two issues: freedom of expression and advertising. “There’s no doubt electronic media is safeguarding freedom of expression for any individual who tries to express his or her views.”
He said, however, that the ease of online publishing often chipped away at journalism standards, a fact that was difficult for the public to recognise.
“People would lose the ability to differentiate between good and bad and here lies the problem with the internet,” he said. “The way to avoid that is to comply with highest journalism standards.”
The growth of electronic media would not lead to the disappearance of print media, he said. “It is too soon to speak of the destruction of newspapers.”
For all your English to Arabic and vice versa translations that will help you expand your business into the Middle East visit Arabic Language Experts at http://www.arabic.com.au/.
by Hassan Hassan
ABU DHABI // Arabic-language online media outlets are burgeoning, but still have little advertising revenue compared with their print counterparts, says a report by the Emirates Centre for Strategic Studies and Research (ECSSR).
The report, published in the latest issue of the centre’s Future Horizons magazine, argued that Arabic-language print media lacked quality, but continued to thrive because advertising buyers had not been persuaded of the value of online ads.
Most print media persisted because in addition to advertising, many publications also received funding from individuals, businesses or governments, it said.
If advertising buyers turned to online media, print media would be in “great danger”.
“Print media is suffering a crisis with their readers for failing to adapt to the constant developments,” said Othman al Umair, the owner of Elaph, one of the first Arabic-language electronic newspapers, which was established in May 2001.
Mr al Umair said the print sector was “trying hard to produce good-looking papers, yet with [poor-quality] news or information, while [electronic media] is succeeding in bringing high-quality news and information directly to the reader”.
The Arab Media Outlook from the Dubai Press Club and the consultancy PricewaterhouseCoopers said that internet advertising revenue in the UAE was expected to grow by 9 per cent a year between 2006 and 2012, while advertising was expected to grow 13 per cent a year at magazines and 16 per cent a year for newspapers in the Emirates.
Online advertising in the Middle East comprised less than 1 per cent of total advertising spending in 2007, the outlook said. In the UAE, print media accounted for 88 per cent of total advertising spending in 2007.
The ECSSR report noted that the continued publication of some Arabic-language newspapers was not an indication of their profitability. When an Arabic-language newspaper stopped publishing, it said, it often did so for political reasons rather than financial ones.
Ghassan Habbal, a researcher at the ECSSR and one of the authors of the report, offered the example of Al Safir, a Lebanese newspaper. The paper’s peak sales are about 10,000 copies, but it attracts about four times the advertising revenue of a website with more than 50,000 readers.
In general, a high-traffic website can expect to recoup about 2 per cent of its costs through advertising, the report said.
Muaffaq Harb, a media expert, said the value of the internet for the advertising community was demographics. Websites can easily collect data on readers, which are valuable for advertisers who want to make sure that their messages reach a specific group.
“Advertising is a decisive factor that would make up for the lack of subscription fees,” he said. “Fees are necessary for specialised websites and newspapers, not the general ones.”
Mr al Umair said the challenges to print media included a greater tolerance for free speech online compared to print.
Mr Harb agreed that the future of electronic media versus print depended on two issues: freedom of expression and advertising. “There’s no doubt electronic media is safeguarding freedom of expression for any individual who tries to express his or her views.”
He said, however, that the ease of online publishing often chipped away at journalism standards, a fact that was difficult for the public to recognise.
“People would lose the ability to differentiate between good and bad and here lies the problem with the internet,” he said. “The way to avoid that is to comply with highest journalism standards.”
The growth of electronic media would not lead to the disappearance of print media, he said. “It is too soon to speak of the destruction of newspapers.”
For all your English to Arabic and vice versa translations that will help you expand your business into the Middle East visit Arabic Language Experts at http://www.arabic.com.au/.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Should Everything be Translated?
Everything of value, yes. Thus says me. Define "value" - you ask. It is a relative term. But if it contains ideas, no matter how dangerous, it should be translated. This is why we fought for freedom of information and expression, for the right of minorities (linguistic and ideological) to be heard. Translation fosters understanding, and can also provide defence. Witness the CIA being lost in translation to get my point.
So articles like the one below make me feel unwell. Is this guy promoting linguistic censorship??
"Misunderstandings can be dangerous. The Chinese Whisper which turns ‘Send reinforcements, we’re going to advance’ into ‘Send three and four pence, we’re going to a dance’ might be apocryphal, but it highlights what can happen when one person fails to catch what another person has said. So, too, does the advert for Berlitz (‘Improve your English’), in which the frantic captain of a boat repeats, ‘Mayday! Mayday! We are sinking!’, only to have the German coastguard reply: ‘Yes? What are you thinking about?’ Generally, we try to minimise such risks – we ask people to repeat the sentence, stand closer, speak louder or rephrase. When two people are speaking different languages, though, they may completely fail to understand each other; in these situations, translators and interpreters are often engaged. It’s disconcerting, frustrating and sometimes terrifying to find that you can’t make sense of an utterance; students, politicians and soldiers are all indebted at some point to translation service providers.
However, sometimes people actively don’t want to understand. The translation of Hebrew-language books into Arabic, for instance, is still a controversial issue in the Arab world, with certain experts in Jordan contending that comprehensive translations risk providing ‘a bridge for cultural penetration and normalisation’. Debate has centred, recently, on the availability in Arabic of Benjamin Netanyahu's A Place under the Sun, which outlines his political views. While admitting that it is important to understand what they call the ‘Zionist ideology’ of Israel, some Arab scholars are concerned that a generation provided with Hebrew texts may come to see Israel as a legitimate state, in opposition to the stance of most Arab countries. This might seem perverse and self-defeating, but it’s a position that has been adopted by various peoples throughout history, not all of whom have seen themselves as being at war. Gaelic speakers in the West of Ireland, say, might refuse to have an English text translated for their children, no matter how useful or interesting it might be; Basque speakers might react in the same way to Spanish.
People can feel strongly about writing, speeches or television programmes because they see them as propaganda, as products of a certain ideology or simply as a reminder of a country and a way of life. Nowadays, as the internet continues to expand, we might see the translation and transmission of information as an inevitable and all-encompassing process, yet not everyone in the world wants to watch a subtitled version of Friends, read a translation of John F. Kennedy’s Berlin speech or, conversely, receive the English version of a pamphlet detailing Sharia law.
A balance between the two stances should probably be maintained. Few people want a world in which countries or continents mark themselves off from one another, refusing to communicate with those speaking another language. Equally, though, it should not be forgotten how important individual languages have been to the development of cultures and traditions; nor should it be forgotten that many kinds of speech are political acts in one way or another. Translation agencies exist to facilitate communication where facilitation is needed; they offer their services to anyone who wants or needs to communicate with those speaking a foreign language. If translation is not wanted, people will not ask, but translation agencies nonetheless ensure that they are familiar with the politics of translation, and with the various cultural or political fault-lines, around the world, which make translation a sensitive issue."
Balance? Writing is a political act, Mr. Specialist. Don't worry - it isn't agencies that will translate the important stuff. It will be the little folks for whom it matters. Agencies are after income not freedom, democracy and ethics. I understand, Mr. Specialist. And oh, do take off that grey, collarless shirt. Even your bosses are beginning to wear ties and suits nowadays!
For all your English to Arabic and vice versa translations that will help you expand your business into the Middle East visit Arabic Language Experts at http://www.arabic.com.au/.
So articles like the one below make me feel unwell. Is this guy promoting linguistic censorship??
"Misunderstandings can be dangerous. The Chinese Whisper which turns ‘Send reinforcements, we’re going to advance’ into ‘Send three and four pence, we’re going to a dance’ might be apocryphal, but it highlights what can happen when one person fails to catch what another person has said. So, too, does the advert for Berlitz (‘Improve your English’), in which the frantic captain of a boat repeats, ‘Mayday! Mayday! We are sinking!’, only to have the German coastguard reply: ‘Yes? What are you thinking about?’ Generally, we try to minimise such risks – we ask people to repeat the sentence, stand closer, speak louder or rephrase. When two people are speaking different languages, though, they may completely fail to understand each other; in these situations, translators and interpreters are often engaged. It’s disconcerting, frustrating and sometimes terrifying to find that you can’t make sense of an utterance; students, politicians and soldiers are all indebted at some point to translation service providers.
However, sometimes people actively don’t want to understand. The translation of Hebrew-language books into Arabic, for instance, is still a controversial issue in the Arab world, with certain experts in Jordan contending that comprehensive translations risk providing ‘a bridge for cultural penetration and normalisation’. Debate has centred, recently, on the availability in Arabic of Benjamin Netanyahu's A Place under the Sun, which outlines his political views. While admitting that it is important to understand what they call the ‘Zionist ideology’ of Israel, some Arab scholars are concerned that a generation provided with Hebrew texts may come to see Israel as a legitimate state, in opposition to the stance of most Arab countries. This might seem perverse and self-defeating, but it’s a position that has been adopted by various peoples throughout history, not all of whom have seen themselves as being at war. Gaelic speakers in the West of Ireland, say, might refuse to have an English text translated for their children, no matter how useful or interesting it might be; Basque speakers might react in the same way to Spanish.
People can feel strongly about writing, speeches or television programmes because they see them as propaganda, as products of a certain ideology or simply as a reminder of a country and a way of life. Nowadays, as the internet continues to expand, we might see the translation and transmission of information as an inevitable and all-encompassing process, yet not everyone in the world wants to watch a subtitled version of Friends, read a translation of John F. Kennedy’s Berlin speech or, conversely, receive the English version of a pamphlet detailing Sharia law.
A balance between the two stances should probably be maintained. Few people want a world in which countries or continents mark themselves off from one another, refusing to communicate with those speaking another language. Equally, though, it should not be forgotten how important individual languages have been to the development of cultures and traditions; nor should it be forgotten that many kinds of speech are political acts in one way or another. Translation agencies exist to facilitate communication where facilitation is needed; they offer their services to anyone who wants or needs to communicate with those speaking a foreign language. If translation is not wanted, people will not ask, but translation agencies nonetheless ensure that they are familiar with the politics of translation, and with the various cultural or political fault-lines, around the world, which make translation a sensitive issue."
Balance? Writing is a political act, Mr. Specialist. Don't worry - it isn't agencies that will translate the important stuff. It will be the little folks for whom it matters. Agencies are after income not freedom, democracy and ethics. I understand, Mr. Specialist. And oh, do take off that grey, collarless shirt. Even your bosses are beginning to wear ties and suits nowadays!
For all your English to Arabic and vice versa translations that will help you expand your business into the Middle East visit Arabic Language Experts at http://www.arabic.com.au/.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Apologia Machina
Agence France-Presse is telling us that the French business newspaper La Tribune is launching a multi-lingual version of its website using automatic translation, dispensing with journalists but producing often comic results.
"Ryanair loan to make travel of the passengers upright," "The Chinese car in ambush," "Internet Explorer: mistrust!" and "Assets of the continental right in management of the crisis" were some of the mysterious headlines the same day on the site, which is still in an experimental phase.
But the paper's editors are confident that the project will, once the software is refined and a human hired to tweak the texts, open La Tribune to a potentially huge international audience. The editors acknowledged that the results on La Tribune were still far from ideal, but said that the software was being continually updated and that within a few months it would achieve "almost perfect" news articles.
*****
Now comes the stick-it-in-apologia-for-us-human-translators:
But it is generally accepted that translation software cannot, as Google Translate admits on its site, "approach the fluency of a native speaker or possess the skill of a professional translator".
Why do I call it an apologia? BECAUSE: "Most of the English articles on La Tribune's site were, with a little effort, understandable despite their many linguistic oddities."
We are willing to pay less and put "a little effort" instead to read garbled English which no longer gets defined as "incorrect" but as "odd".
Except that I wouldn't get paid for being "odd", but some idiot would pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to purchase a software that is. Amazing!
For all your English to Arabic and vice versa translations that will help you expand your business into the Middle East visit Arabic Language Experts at http://www.arabic.com.au/.
"Ryanair loan to make travel of the passengers upright," "The Chinese car in ambush," "Internet Explorer: mistrust!" and "Assets of the continental right in management of the crisis" were some of the mysterious headlines the same day on the site, which is still in an experimental phase.
But the paper's editors are confident that the project will, once the software is refined and a human hired to tweak the texts, open La Tribune to a potentially huge international audience. The editors acknowledged that the results on La Tribune were still far from ideal, but said that the software was being continually updated and that within a few months it would achieve "almost perfect" news articles.
*****
Now comes the stick-it-in-apologia-for-us-human-translators:
But it is generally accepted that translation software cannot, as Google Translate admits on its site, "approach the fluency of a native speaker or possess the skill of a professional translator".
Why do I call it an apologia? BECAUSE: "Most of the English articles on La Tribune's site were, with a little effort, understandable despite their many linguistic oddities."
We are willing to pay less and put "a little effort" instead to read garbled English which no longer gets defined as "incorrect" but as "odd".
Except that I wouldn't get paid for being "odd", but some idiot would pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to purchase a software that is. Amazing!
For all your English to Arabic and vice versa translations that will help you expand your business into the Middle East visit Arabic Language Experts at http://www.arabic.com.au/.
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
Googling in Arabic
From the Financial Times:
When it comes to the internet, the Arab world punches well below its weight. Less than 1 per cent of the internet’s content is in Arabic, while the world’s approximately 370m Arabs form more than 5 per cent of the global population.
Internet usage has jumped 1,000 per cent over the past seven years in the Middle East, yet it still lags well behind other regions. Overall internet penetration has reached 10 to 12 per cent, although with the region’s large number of shared connections, up to 50 per cent of the population is estimated to have access to the net.
Google, the internet company, hopes to provide the tools that will help users to increase the amount of Arabic content online. The regional engineering team, based in Switzerland, is adapting existing Google products to the Arabic language while also developing new bespoke products, says Ahmad Hamzawi, Google’s engineering manager for the Middle East. Google News, Blogger and the company’s new browser, Chrome, have Arabic versions. The company’s suite of “cloud applications”, such as Google documents and calendar, has also been changed to include regional features. More innovative is Ta3reeb, which allows users who do not have an Arabic keyboard or cannot write Arabic script to transliterate phonetically into Arabic text through an English keyboard.
“For me the impact of it is very powerful because people can start publishing in a very easy, simple manner, directly in Arabic,” says Gisel Hiscock, the company’s director of new business development for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. While penetration may lag behind, the region is quickly adopting social media trends, such as Facebook, the social networking site, and Twitter, the micro-blogging site.
___________________________________________________________________
Comment: Why do I find it normal that Arabs would go for social software more than for other Internet uses? Isn't that part of the culture - extended families, clans, tribes, networks of related people who could be all over the world? Blogging, too, since you have your mouth glued by censorship most of the time.
___________________________________________________________________
Ahmed Nassef, general manager of Arabic web portal Maktoob.com, says cultural tweaking is as important as translation when launching regional products. “Besides just offering up an Arabic interface, companies need to take the time to really understand cultural and social factors – what works in London may not work in Cairo,” he says.
___________________________________________________________________
Comment: Keep dreaming. No profit-oriented business has the time to waste on understanding culture and language and all that wet stuff that makes the world outside their own. Especially not US businesses, where learning a second language is hopelessly low on the priority list.
____________________________________________________________________
From the Middle East Institute Blog
Although most Google applications, plus Facebook and other media now have Arabic language front-ends that allow people to blog, e-mail, etc. in Arabic, there are still many challenges to fuller Internet penetration. One is the simple one of illiteracy in the Arab world, which is still high by global standards, especially among women. Another is the problem the linguists call "diglossia": the fact that Modern Standard Arabic, the language of newspapers, university instruction, public speeches, etc., is actually no one's first language; Arabs grow up speaking their own local dialect (usually referred to as ‘amiyya or lahja in the East and darija in the Maghreb), which they learn at their mother's knee. They don't just have to learn to read the language they already speak: they have to learn a related but more complex and formal language that no one speaks today, or may ever have spoken as such. It's a deterrent not only to literacy but to entering the public sphere as a journalist, politician, or academic expected to perform in Modern Standard Arabic.
__________________________________________________________________
Comment: This is not limited to the Arabic language. There are dialects in every single language in the world that has more than 1000 speakers. Illiteracy is a problem, granted, but that has nothing to do with the fact that MSA is different from the spoken language. It has to do with corruption, over-population and poverty.
___________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in the differences between MSA and dialects, you can read the rest of the posting here, but take what the guy says with a barrel of salt.
When it comes to the internet, the Arab world punches well below its weight. Less than 1 per cent of the internet’s content is in Arabic, while the world’s approximately 370m Arabs form more than 5 per cent of the global population.
Internet usage has jumped 1,000 per cent over the past seven years in the Middle East, yet it still lags well behind other regions. Overall internet penetration has reached 10 to 12 per cent, although with the region’s large number of shared connections, up to 50 per cent of the population is estimated to have access to the net.
Google, the internet company, hopes to provide the tools that will help users to increase the amount of Arabic content online. The regional engineering team, based in Switzerland, is adapting existing Google products to the Arabic language while also developing new bespoke products, says Ahmad Hamzawi, Google’s engineering manager for the Middle East. Google News, Blogger and the company’s new browser, Chrome, have Arabic versions. The company’s suite of “cloud applications”, such as Google documents and calendar, has also been changed to include regional features. More innovative is Ta3reeb, which allows users who do not have an Arabic keyboard or cannot write Arabic script to transliterate phonetically into Arabic text through an English keyboard.
“For me the impact of it is very powerful because people can start publishing in a very easy, simple manner, directly in Arabic,” says Gisel Hiscock, the company’s director of new business development for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. While penetration may lag behind, the region is quickly adopting social media trends, such as Facebook, the social networking site, and Twitter, the micro-blogging site.
___________________________________________________________________
Comment: Why do I find it normal that Arabs would go for social software more than for other Internet uses? Isn't that part of the culture - extended families, clans, tribes, networks of related people who could be all over the world? Blogging, too, since you have your mouth glued by censorship most of the time.
___________________________________________________________________
Ahmed Nassef, general manager of Arabic web portal Maktoob.com, says cultural tweaking is as important as translation when launching regional products. “Besides just offering up an Arabic interface, companies need to take the time to really understand cultural and social factors – what works in London may not work in Cairo,” he says.
___________________________________________________________________
Comment: Keep dreaming. No profit-oriented business has the time to waste on understanding culture and language and all that wet stuff that makes the world outside their own. Especially not US businesses, where learning a second language is hopelessly low on the priority list.
____________________________________________________________________
From the Middle East Institute Blog
Although most Google applications, plus Facebook and other media now have Arabic language front-ends that allow people to blog, e-mail, etc. in Arabic, there are still many challenges to fuller Internet penetration. One is the simple one of illiteracy in the Arab world, which is still high by global standards, especially among women. Another is the problem the linguists call "diglossia": the fact that Modern Standard Arabic, the language of newspapers, university instruction, public speeches, etc., is actually no one's first language; Arabs grow up speaking their own local dialect (usually referred to as ‘amiyya or lahja in the East and darija in the Maghreb), which they learn at their mother's knee. They don't just have to learn to read the language they already speak: they have to learn a related but more complex and formal language that no one speaks today, or may ever have spoken as such. It's a deterrent not only to literacy but to entering the public sphere as a journalist, politician, or academic expected to perform in Modern Standard Arabic.
__________________________________________________________________
Comment: This is not limited to the Arabic language. There are dialects in every single language in the world that has more than 1000 speakers. Illiteracy is a problem, granted, but that has nothing to do with the fact that MSA is different from the spoken language. It has to do with corruption, over-population and poverty.
___________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in the differences between MSA and dialects, you can read the rest of the posting here, but take what the guy says with a barrel of salt.
For all your English to Arabic and vice versa translations that will help you expand your business into the Middle East visit Arabic Language Experts at http://www.arabic.com.au/
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