Speaker 1: Hello fellow translators. Today I want to talk to you a bit about post-editing, machine translation post-editing, or post-editing, you know, post-machine translation editing. You see it called in different ways. I think it's supposed to be called machine translation post-editing, but I've seen a lot of different ways. In fact, this one job announcement said post-machine translation. Yeah, editing for post-machine translation. Anyway, what this means is basically, well, first of all, I've been seeing a lot of it and you will probably see it too if you are looking for jobs in, you know, and in Translators Cafe, Prose, or any one of those places. Some people might say we need someone to help out with some editing, post-machine translation, or even just to help with post-machine translation, post-MT, something like that. And so I just wanted to talk about it a little bit because I feel like we're going to be getting more and more of this. First of all, what is it? What it means is basically they use some form of machine translation, so think like Google Translate, and they want someone to help edit after that. Now, I've had this policy where I refuse to do any of that because to me that's a lazy way out of just trying to get an editor. In fact, so what some people will try to do, in fact, they'll try to sneak it in and say I just need an editor and not tell you that it was machine translated, but pretend that it was translated by a real person, they just need someone to edit after. And those, I mean, it's usually pretty easy to figure out, and it's happened to me before. In fact, they didn't use Google Translate, they used Bing Translate. But I could tell something was a bit off with the translation, so I ran the original text through Bing and it spat out the exact translation they had, and I'm like, look, you obviously used Bing for this, I'm happy to translate it from scratch, but I'm not going to edit this because it's not editing. And so I just wanted to give you my two cents about this. Like I said, I've always refused to do it, but I recognize that there's more and more of it happening, and so, you know, you're going to keep seeing more and more of it. And so I'm not sure if that's always the best policy. I think if you already have clients and you already have something going, then you probably should just avoid these, because these are kind of a mess for several reasons that I'll get into. But, you know, maybe if you're just starting out, you kind of want any job you can get, and so yeah, you know, then if someone has a post-machine translation editing job, then it might be something that you might be interested in. So here's the thing, though, that you should keep into account. Like, in the same way that I could figure out that this wasn't translated by someone and that it was done with machine translation, and in fact I saw it and then I ran it through Bing, that's because machine translation does that. It gives you, it spits out a weird translation. They're getting better, and depending, it will always depend on the context on this, that, and the other, and all that. But if they're translating a whole document using machine translation, they're going to be parts of it, you know, it's going to come out weird. And the bad thing is, it doesn't use, at least if it's translated by a person, you can kind of get used to the issues they have, or you can say, oh no, every time they translated that, they use this, and you know, they shouldn't be doing that, or whatever it might be. Machine translation, you have no idea. Sometimes they'll translate one term one way, another time another way. They don't take into account in this paragraph what happened two paragraphs before, or anything like that. It can be a real mess to try to edit this. So here's what I would say. If you ever get a request, or you see a request for someone who needs post machine translation editing, machine translation post editing, whatever it might be, I would, and if you want to accept, then I would accept, but according to certain conditions. First of all, you're going to charge more than just editing, because it's not just editing, it's more than that. In fact, I would probably charge a translation rate, and say, you know, as if you translate it from scratch. You know, maybe you can do a bit less, but you should, but you should state that you want, I want the original text, and the, you know, machine translated text, and that you can even specify. You can say, because they're not going to be consistent, you know, the terms aren't translated consistently, etc, etc. So I need to go through now with a fine-tooth comb, and try to figure out what's translated, in which way, and which one works, and which one doesn't. Remember, most of the people who are putting these jobs out, post machine translation, they have no clue how these things work. They haven't probably worked with machine translation before at all, and they're just using Google Translate. And that brings me to the other point, you should ask them what they use to do the machine translation, because if it was Bing or Google Translate, then you're in real trouble. There are other forms of machine translation that are a bit better, but that's kind of besides the point, but the fact that if they use another form of machine translation, it kind of means that they know a bit more of what they're doing, and I always feel better working with someone who knows a bit more what they're doing, because they know what to look out for, and what not to, etc. So those are just the things I would look out for. I would probably charge more than you do for editing, definitely, and probably charge as much as you do for translation, maybe just slightly less. And I would mention it, be like, since this is not editing, you know, post translator editing, but post machine translation editing, then, you know, this is how much I charge. And, you know, you can leave it at that, and then if they ask you, oh, why are you doing it, then you can give all the reasons for it. But, you know, and the other thing, by the way, is if you do find mistakes or issues or something like that, if there's another translator, they can always go back to the translator, be like, hey, this person found this mistake. Why did they find the mistake? Is that right? The translator can defend themselves and say, you can use both, or no, I don't know. You can't do that with machine translation. If they give it to an editor, and I say, I don't like the way this was translated, it seems wrong, and I send it back, and they're like, I don't know, the machine translation one seemed good. Why does he, this translator say this way? You can't ask a machine how, why they translated that way. So, anyway, it's, there are many issues that can come up. I haven't gone through all of them, but it just can become really messy very quickly, and so that's why I tend to avoid them. I recommend, if you already have some businesses going, and things are kind of going okay, then to just avoid them. But if you do want to take them, just keep in mind, it will be more work than just normal editing. And so you should be paid accordingly. And, you know, so reflect that in your rate, and in the amount of time it's going to take, the amount of effort and energy it's going to take, because unfortunately that's the way it is. But yeah, I don't have much experience myself in editing post machine translation. Again, because I don't do it. So if you do have other experiences, feel free to let me know, but that's sort of based on my little experience, and, but from what I've seen, that's what I would recommend. You know, feel free to let me know if, again, if you have other experience with it, because I know it will change, and it will depend also on what type of translations are being done. Like, if someone's trying to translate poetry, and they use Google Translate, I mean, forget it. That, that, obviously you can't do any type of editing after that. But, you know, maybe for something that's a bit more standardized, or just a list of terms, or something, maybe, you know, then it's easier to work with. I don't know. So anyway, feel free to let me know what your thoughts are on this, if you have different thoughts. Otherwise, I hope you find this useful, because I do think you're going to come across machine translation in the future, going ahead. I think it's going to happen more and more, and unfortunately, a lot of people are, a lot of clients are just going to use it as a shortcut, so try to keep that in mind. And what else? That's pretty much it. Hopefully you find this useful. Don't forget to click thumbs up if you do find it useful. Don't forget to subscribe if you haven't. And don't forget, once again, if you want to leave a comment, please feel free to leave a comment. But I would like it if, right before you comment, in like brackets, or in parentheses, something like that, you just put your language combination. Even if you're not yet a professional translator, or whatever it might be, just put, you know, English to Spanish, or EN-SP, or whatever, or ES, I guess, or whatever it might be. And, you know, just to get an idea of what other languages other people are dealing with. I thought that was a fun thing, and I've noticed lately I've stopped mentioning that. But yeah, that's pretty much it. I'll see you in the next video. Okay, thanks. Bye. See you later.