Advice about a problem with my team

Hi I´m a CM of a channel and I have problems with my team because I shose a english moderator and also and All idioms- moderator- chief editor for separate I would like to know if a chose a English moderador he / she automatically become an all moderator languge and chief editor?
What is the functions of aAll languages moderator ?
And what is the funtions of English moderator?
Thanks.
Daniela

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All language moderator is a sort of a sub-CM. He/she is able to recruit moderators of all languages besides English and supervise the translation to those languages.

English moderator’s basic role is to “moderate” (correct, adapt) English language only. And then to tell you, the CM, when the English language is completed so that you may inform moderators of other languages it’s okay to start translating that particular episode.

The two functions can be performed by the same person. But, honestly, I as the “Other” language mod don’t like that because I want English editors to focus primarily on the English language, to perfect it so that the rest of us translating from English to other languages can have an easier job. It makes it significantly easier for the entire team to have a really good and un-ambivalent English language on a project.

You as a CM, when recruiting, define which exact role(s) each person has. If you feel like one person has stepped out of bounds, you may go back to your initial communication via messages and see what has been agreed upon.

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Usually these are three separate people.

The official description of what a Moderator does, according to the Help Center:

  • Adding a translation of the Channel Description and Channel Title in their language
  • Editing the Community Wall/Cover Page design in their language
  • Locking/unlocking subtitles in each language
  • Moderating Timed Comments

Chief Editor
The Chief Editor position does not have a special designation in the Manage Page, as you well know, so s/he is also English moderator. For a 16-episode or more drama you need more than one English moderator anyway. So you choose one of the two or the three to serve as Chief Editor.
What does a Chief Editor do?
Either the English Chief Editor or the CM gathers the subbers from the original language into English, makes the cover page, This is fluid area, CM and Mod have to agree on who does what. In my experience, they usually collaborate in gathering a team. Senior Chief Editors like cgwm_808 choose all the other English moderators themselves - presumably without asking the CM.
The Chief Editor writes the Notes with formatting, grammar and style guidelines, searches for OST lyrics and updates the notes with new name spellings etc.
The Chief Editor can communicate with Ko-En subbers and with the Translation Editor to clarify any doubts about the translation.
Sometimes the Chief Editor communicates the release of an episode to Other Languages, while in some other instances it’s the CM who does this, so the Chief Editor tells the CM that everything is ready and it can be released.

Other English moderators
The other English moderatorsm in most teams I’ve been, are automatically also editors (otherwise there would be precious little work for them!). They do a first edit, right after Translation Editor has finished, and then the Chief Editor will go and give the final look.
Of course they can do all the “official” jobs stated at the beginning of this post like moderating Timed Comments and also reply to/flag Disqus comments. From what I’ve found, most can’t be bothered with Timed Comments, and it’s one person who volunteers to do it.
As for the Cover Page, again it’s a grey area. Usually the CM decides who is going to do it and/or begs some outside designer to help.

Translation Editor
This person is also an English Moderator, but he’s usually a native speaker of the original video language who also knows decent English.

The All languages moderator
The All languages moderator can also be an English moderator, doing what they all do, but in addition, s/he has the capability of entering the Other Languages to change stuff there if needed.
This is especially useful for the Chief Segmenter, and especially if it’s a drama already segmented and subbed, and you have to fix bad segments. Why? Because if the Chief segmenter decides that two segments have to be merged into one, s/he must shift the sub of segment B at the end of segment A before deleting segment B (and then of course segment A will be extended to also take the place of the deleted segment B). Therefore, to avoid losing the content of segment B in other languages, you have to go to each one of those languages and shift the subs.
(That’s how I got a badge in Indonesian, Portuguese and Romanian, of which I know nothing, and Spanish, of which I know very little)

Absolutely not! Those things have to be agreed upon beforehand, and written on the Cover Page. All these people are added as just “English moderators”, but as you saw, under that umbrella, there are quite a few different jobs assigned to different people.

Key question is what do you, as a CM, want an English moderator to do? They are there to help you to manage your channel.

In my teams an English moderator is assigned to various things which can differ from project to project.

  • Keep an eye on the comment section to answer questions or flag comments which are against the guidelines (this goes for all languages).
  • Notifying seggers/subbers (unless I decide to do that otherwise)
  • Moderate timed comments
  • Notify me when something is off or step in when I’m away.

Other languages do all the things that concern their language like managing their subbing team and recruit subbers. Lock/unlock their language. Make their community wall if their language needs one. They are free to manage their team as they want. Some use Team discussion aswell but most use google docs to keep track of the process and such in their language. But I also heard some subbing teams use whatsapp, kakaotalk or facebook. Well whatever works for them.

Chief editor for English get’s an all language or CM position in my team so they have more ‘powers’ to do their job without asking me to do something. All other editors for the English get an English mod position so they as well can do their job better without asking me to lock/unlock etc. For all other languages I assign 2 moderators maximum and the 2nd one will be added per request of the first.

So no someone who is just a moderator doesn’t do anything with the subs unless you asked them to do. Some people in teams do multitask which is totally fine. Communication is key and thats why people should check the wall to see who has which position because the volunteers tab can be misleading.

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If you add an all languages moderator, he/she could be the designer for the coverpage. Or he/she could be an English moderator or the Chief Editor. But this depends on your agreement with this person.

Viki has no special position for the editors, so you as the CM must add every English editor as an English moderator. I think, you can only add 3 English moderators, so if you need more, you can add the Chief Editor as the all languages moderator. But the all languages moderator is not automatically the Chief Editor.

Usually the English team consists of one or more english moderators, you need one Translation Editor, one General Editor and one Chief Editor. You as the CM can add the subtitlers and the English moderators as well as the editors and the Chief Editor. But you can give these duties to the English moderator or the Chief Editor. Usually the Chief Editor chooses the subtitlers and adds them to the team. He/she could choose the other editors as well. The Chief Editor has the highest position of the editors and English moderators.

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Okay now I feel your pain, every answer is different.

First…realize the Korean Dramas are run differently than the Chinese Dramas. Step 1. Determine which type of drama yours is. If it’s neither, then there’s less direction than perhaps looking at dramas from the same country OR asking a Channel Manager you respect for help. :slight_smile:

(And before anybody starts arguing about this one, READ the on-air cover pages… :slight_smile: it’s clear as day!)

IF…your drama is a Korean Drama -- then…things move differently. Depending on WHO you hire for your Chief Editor, some - like cgwm808…also want to hire your Subtitle Team. You may also have up to SIX English Moderators…some “cheerleaders” listed as “English Moderators” who do well, nothing. Except cheer the Team on. So…IF you have Korean Drama, my advice is find an experienced CM who you respect and seek guidance there. (Yes, I’ve segmented on a drama that had six “Eng Mods” listed on the cover page…PLUS the CE and full editing team!)

IF…your drama is a Chinese Drama…then things run in a less complicated way, BUT…Much depends on who you hire. GENERALLY the English Moderator, like ANY other Language Team Moderator, HIRES the Subtitle translation Team. They also, depending on their ability, MAY do the first edit of the work. (Again, like one would expect ANY Language Moderator to do).

GENERALLY, because there is no pure “EDIT” Team position you can give the Editors, who are responsible for taking the work after the English Moderator and their Team have completed it, and then giving it the final polish to hand it to the Other Language teams. These persons, Editors, are given the English Moderator key OR an All Languages Key - if you want to differentiate them from the English Moderator. USUALLY there are not “extra” English moderators on a Chinese Drama.

The CHIEF Editor is to then hand over the completed English version finally to other languages for their USE OR the CM may do this also. No law says you can’t do it either way. :slight_smile:

Again…MUCH depends on who you hire, what their skill sets are. It’s best to know what abilities you hire when you hire your Team - and who you will be looking to in order to fulfill the needs of the drama and hopefully, make your experience smooth and kind. :slight_smile:

Channel Manager is not the easiest job in the world, it can be very challenging, it can be a lot of fun. It can be a royal pain in the neck. A good CM hires people who will get along with each other, are competent, and very capable in their positions. If there are questions as to the duties of each, make it clear as they are hired. It’s also a good idea to talk to an existing English Moderator or Editor before hiring in the rest of the English folks - again, there are style differences and other things that should be vetted to ensure the best work and smooth functioning to start your drama well. :slight_smile:

I wish you the very best, and I hope you can find your way through all the well-meant advice you see here. :slight_smile:

GeNie of the Lamp

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Ohh I didn’t know that Chinese drama work differently but maybe that’s also due the “gone with the shirt” team? Almost all Chinese drama I watch is done by them.

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Again…

The problems started not because of a “moderator” problem. Stop focusing on that.

The problem lies with the fact that you had a CE and an editing team. THEN… that original CE was removed and her team without discussion, provocation, or notice. And replaced with another CE.

Lol! I actually worked on one of these projects with a gazillion English editors. Probably the lowest quality of subtitles in the end. You need one or two dedicated individuals to (ideally) BOTH go through the entire drama for the sake of consistency.

WHAT?! I mean, WHAAAAT?! How is this even possible??? And on Viki?

That’s NOT how things are done around here and never has been. I don’t know how things got this way, but the second CE then needs to excuse himself.

Ouch :smiley: :smiley: :smiley: I love the way you said that.

Oh! Now that is something brand new! I would like to know details like who, when, where, which drama? Do we have a self proclaimed boss around here, or maybe the boss is not self proclaimed?

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Look how sayid everyone here. I can the right to chose one Chief editor and one English moderator. I chose you like English moderator and the other person like Chief editor I think that both are differents which is true. You did´nt want to work with the chief editor that I chose so you wanted to out of the team. And yes could be that I was wrong because I chose other chief editor and I do´nt told you but YOU HAVE TO TAKE IN MIND THAT I´M NEW BEING CM SO I DONT KNEW WELL HOW ARE THE THINGS.
Like they say here not always the All languages moderator is English moderator too so I was right. Just that you get mad because I did´nt want to put like All languages moderator but yes like English moderator. you asking me the english moderator position and I gave it to you but I chose other All languages moderator and you got mad. I did´nt rectract with my word, you were the English moderator but when you realized that I have other all language moderator you got mad and did´nt want to share either the edition with her so you decides got out of the team.
Could be that I have some part of the fault but they said not always all in English moderation and edition team go for one person, you have to learn to share with other people too.

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For clarify I told to the other person that if she wanted to be my All languages moderator she never sent me a request asking me the position. I sent her a message.

please see below

PS. Even the way she send the GO was rude. I have evidence of all this just in case.

Done by them, and most of the time never finished, but they still going strong

.PS. I am talking about the Spanish subtitles done by the Spanish team of Gone with the shirt. I’m not talking about Englishsubtitles

As a member of said Gone With the Shirt Team, if a drama is unfinished or really slow at being subbed, there are valid reasons. Just send a polite PM to the Chief Editor for the English subs or the Language Moderator for others.

Also sometimes the English team moderators are gathered at the beginning of a drama before the first episode is uploaded. Normally these names are not deleted later out of courtesy. If they drop a drama or are unavailable, there may be inactive mods on the roster.

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I don’t know if it’s because the Mods have gone inactive or because a subber has to work on it on their own.
I know I took a year to finish the Dutch subs on a Chinese drama, because I was mostly working by myself.
But at the end I got some wonderful help :slight_smile:

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Wow een jaar lang. Ik weet niet of ik dat zou hebben volgehouden.

Translation: Wow for a year, I don’t know if I was able to stick to it for so long.

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Yes, I know that there are a lot of people who really rely on the Spanish subtitles, because they can’t follow the English ones. If they keep quitting, that is very bad! I often work with the GWTS-team but I hadn’t noticed that the Spanish Team doesn’t finish their assignment :cry: that sucks though!

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Hehe, ja op een gegeven moment raakte ik er ook gefrustreerd door. Meer ook omdat de drama zo frustrerend was en dan krijg je niet bepaald zin om het af te maken :wink: Maar aan de andere kant heb ik altijd de drang om projecten af te maken waaraan ik begonnen ben :blush:

TR: Yeah, I also got frustrated during that year. Mainly, because the drama was frustrating, so it doesn’t really motivate you to finish it. But on the other hand I always feel the need to finish the projects I’m working on.

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