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| andrew |
 Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2009 4:42 pm |
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Joined: 23 Feb 2007
Posts: 9
Location: UK
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Is crowd-sourcing a good idea for localized online content?
In theory, a crowd sourcing model is more achievable than ever before in these days of anyone being able to contribute online, whether to newspaper columns, encyclopedias and so on.
A crowd sourcing is where end "power"/expert users would provide localized online content. Naturally, they would need to go through some sort of screening process to be deemed suitable to be on such a team and it would need to be worth their while to contribute their time for translating for free.
But there are still real dangers here to using this model rather than conventional localization providers. The main one is quality and consitency. How can this be assured and controlled with this model? |
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| Guy |
| Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2009 5:29 pm |
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Site Admin
Joined: 19 Feb 2007
Posts: 21
Location: Alameda, CA
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I'll let better minds than mine discuss how to control quality in crowdsourced L10N projects, but I can attest that it typically does not work as well as theory suggests (Seifert's Law of Theory and Practice: In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is.)
From what I have seen in the Open Source software community, the management of the L10N projects leaves much to be desired. Since translations are on a volunteer basis and performed as an afterthought (as is much of the original documentation), there are few resources for quality checking. There is also a lack of discipline in the process -- things like review of glossaries before an l10n project.
That being said, some of the more mature Open Source projects (most of the Mozillia teams) are pretty good. |
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