Contributors who want to demotivate other contributors on purpose

General Discussion
48

Actually, I wasn’t done working on my post when the entire SITE went down. You might look at the time stamp. That is item 1. :slight_smile: but hey, no worries. I like you as a human, seriously. :slight_smile: which is why…

Item 2. I handed you your gauntlet back - meaning I was not likely to go full-tilt (duel with lance on horseback in armor…or handbags at dawn. :slight_smile: ) and well, use it. :slight_smile: I mean, if I WERE going that route, well, then I’d to check your profile and see what dramas you did that were on-air within the last 12 exact months. And then go look that up, etc. Ridiculous waste of time.

And then I would compare it to the number of on-airs to see what percentage you worked. And then I would yes, have to go look at those dramas to see where Carmen Sandiego IS absolutely everywhere!

I have better things to do trying to get English complete. :slight_smile: Soooo I really don’t think that is necessary and again…well…on to:

Item 3. You really, really should not have brought up the Spanish subtitles, I repeat, you are in a box canyon and the ammunition is substantial.

There are plenty of on-air dramas from the past year of all varieties missing significant numbers of Spanish-subtitled episodes. I looked at exactly 3. 2 are not done. Romanians…have done Chinese Paladin 3 already. :slight_smile: now there’s a fast crew, oh yes. Tong is 12 episodes! And that was not a popular show? Goodness…

And why would we only be concerned with dramas popular only in Spanish-speaking countries for subbing into Spanish? That too is pretty funny. I mean, the most popular are likely telenovelas…ALREADY IN SPANISH. :slight_smile: Is not also the purpose here to give people a chance to view things not necessarily as popular in their own home country, from around the world? :slight_smile:

And it does seem possible you have not viewed Nirvana in Fire…54 episodes of the best drama in the world, by many accounts! If you want Spanish - well it’s not done. And my understanding is that they even have gone back and re-edited segments and Chinese to English already!

Take a tour around, read some of the begging for Spanish subtitles, and you’ll find plenty of Chinese dramas sitting and waiting for Spanish subtitles. Also Korean dramas, since you want to push that button too. :slight_smile: Possibly Japanese, but I haven’t worked on any of those yet. :slight_smile:

The biggest challenge around here is getting English complete from the Asian languages. Once that is complete, there are arguably a large contingent of folks with Spanish and English skills here. Ask around, what is the most difficult subber to find…and you might get well, anything but Spanish as your answer. :slight_smile:

Perhaps it really is time for a survey to be taken of ALL dramas here, except those with the original language being Spanish, and figure out what we can do to get this problem solved. :slight_smile:

Warmest Regards…

Crouching Dieter, Hidden Donut
And I don’t have to look far, actually, for a lot of English-complete episodes without Spanish to go with them. :slight_smile: sigh.

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53

A society has good people and bad people too. Same with Viki.
There are lot of nice channel manager I accidentally know like @babyinspiritestar1 @sophie2you @mirna023_316
I don’t know who they are or what country they come from but we have one thing in common, we do love drama. Hope you get over this problem and have a good time on Viki

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Again your examples are all Chinese. I thought I addressed that, saying that I’m not speaking of Chinese dramas, I know nothing of them, and I even ventured the idea that maybe it is because Spanish-speaking people are not that interested in them either. There were not so many people requesting and clamouring etc…, and not so many subbers asking desperately to be on the teams.

On-air dramas I’ve been on since last spring?
Jackpot, Ms Temper,Second to Last Love, W, Five Children, The Man Living in Our House, The Legend of the Blue Sea, Romantic Doctor Kim, Solomon’s Perjury and now Hwarang, Saimdang, Tomorrow with you, Chief Kim.
Of course you cannot check now, but I can assure you the Spanish was finished within hours after the English was released.
OK, 12 on-line shows is not a big number. But also the older ones I’ve tackled, both dramas and films, where there were some languages finished and some not, in every single occasion the Spanish was done fully.
Please note I’m not claiming statistical value here, I just shared my amazement that your statement was completely opposite from my personal experience. And can it be a coincidence that all the ones I’ve been on had this characteristic? I don’t believe in coincidences. I think the only reason is that they happened to be popular with Spanish-speaking audiences, that’s all.

I’m a bit surprised at that question. The subbers are viewers too. They choose to take part in the projects they like, and channels are requested for dramas that feature popular stars/writers and what sounds as an engaging story and which have great demand. I thought this is an obvious thing which we wouldn’t need to mention or discuss.
It seems that, apart from telenovelas which are a given, Spanish-speakers also like k-drama. Why I don’t know, but they do. And also k-pop, it appears, at least in Latin America, since many k-pop stars hold concerts there.

The purpose is to give people a chance to view things not as popular? Yes, but to do that, at least the CM, Moderator and subbers should like it and say “Oh, it’s not very popular but I adore it and I make it my mission to prepare it, so that people will also discover it”. Someone has to like it a lot for this to happen. And when I say “someone”, I mean at least 5-6 people, unless we’re talking not of a team but of a solo project.
As we are volunteers, we follow our own whim when choosing what project to apply to. You cannot change this simple fact, because - at least for now - that’s how viki works.

This is also true for Korean dramas, of course. There are some which are not finished because the team didn’t like them enough and there was not enough interest. Often the drama is indifferent to begin with. I mean, it took me a lot of commitment to finish “Typically women” which was cringe-worthy, and “Thirty Plus”, a totally boring Taiwanese thing. At the time I was a newbie, and I took whatever was thrown at me. Nowadays, if it’s an oldish thing, or it has already started even by a few episodes I am careful to watch a little before taking it on.
I was asked to moderate an on-air Chinese drama this summer. It had a Korean star and seemed very popular. As it had already started, I watched a little bit (couldn’t bring myself to watch more than 1 episode) and I politely declined. Why spend my precious time and energy on something I don’t want to even watch as a viewer?
(Hey, we’re doing this for free, it shouldn’t be a chore, we should at least like it, right?)

By the way, dear Linda, I find your passion delightful and I’m a self-professed admirer of your writing style, so I don’t view this as a gauntlet-throwing thing or such, just a pleasant way to spend ten minutes in early morning, before starting to do my rounds on my projects.

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56

The fact is that Korean on-air dramas do get subbed in Spanish quickly. Older k-dramas? Here and there. Some misses for sure. It also depends on the k-drama. The most popular ones sure get subbed fast. Unfortunately, we don’t have a lot of j-drama around here. The two channels I’ve had for j-dramas have been done quickly, but then again, they are 11 episodes long. Which brings me to another point, length. Longer dramas are tough for any team, but in k-drama they do get done.

The point with c-drama is a valid one. So many that are just left there with no subs in Spanish. The number of Spanish-speaking viewers on Viki has to be high. You can tell just by the number of comments and such. I would be willing to bet that it is the second most popular language (among viewers) after English. Asian dramas are huge in Central and South America. They even dubbed them into Spanish in some countries because they like them so much. Plus Spanish telenovelas have seen a decline lately…very sad.

Anyway, just wanted to add my two cents.

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57

So sweet @trangle850. Appreciate the kind words. I’m in the U.S., by the way. :slight_smile:

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58

I don’t know much about subtitling or segmenting (I don’t really have the time or willpower to join in but I did buy a pass to try to support licensing stuff) but:

I wouldn’t take criticism or rejection as a personal attack. Easier said than done - but at the end of the day what people (and the groups of subtitlers/segmenters) are trying to do is efficiently, effectively and quickly get subtitles up for people (like me) so we can enjoy shows.

A team is efficient, effective and quick when they all know each other and work together well. Adding a bunch of new people and having people drop in and out hurts that. Yeah it sucks when you want to help and you are met with “thanks but we’re not accepting people on to the team” but that’s life sometimes.

Maybe there are better ways of handling things or systems that could be put in place but I don’t know enough to comment on it.

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64

Thank you! I am also in the USA. I actually don’t watch much drama but caught the translator bug unfortunately.

btw cgwm did edit that one subtitle you pm’d me about.

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@sophie2you @mirna023_316 my pleasure to be in your team. By the way, I’m in the south of the United States.

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66

I’m facing this right now.
I was added as a CM for channel that was being abused by random users coming and creating empty 1 sec. segments to increase their segmenting count. Almost each episode was 80% subbed because of that.
The original CM was gone for more than a year (still gone even now) and she did not reply to messages. That is why Viki staff added me as co-CM and I went ahead and removed those segments and locked them.
However, I then get are really hate-filled message from the other CM and her moderators saying that I stole her work and that I’m lying about there being empty segments (after I fixed them). That really discouraged and offended me cause I was accused of stealing their work. I informed Viki staff about it and they talked to them. But now they are back at it, when I informed them that the license will expire.
I vowed to never ask to be the CM or even tell staff about problems in a show in the fear that I will be added as a CM. I’ll just stick to being a moderator.
Even now, I want to ask the staff to remove me from the team, but the channel sometimes faces technical problems that erases lots of the subs. Lucky, when I inform Viki about it they fix it quickly.

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67

So… They would not reply to your messages but resurfaced to accuse you? Nice.

68

Sweetie, just these sentences alone tell me you understand and know more than you know. I’m more jealous/envious because my French and Spanish are relegated to 1 year of high school (FR) and 3 years of high school (ES). hugs

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69

I’m in the south, too. coughtexascough

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71

Oh my God, that tired “we’ve been here since 2008”. Nobody cares!

I guess they see themselves as Mean Girls or something…

Most teams are people who don’t know each other, never met each other, and they do their volunteering just fine. It must be magic!

Still, she didn’t care enough to reply to your messages, but someone wants something she threw away? Let’s turn the cannons on!

I know it’s hard to not care about people’s lack of basic manners, but you really not need to care. Just delete their messages. Viki should fix this, it’s their responsibility. If they don’t that’s their fault (and their problem, eventually.)

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72

Viki did interfere after I told them that I wanted to be removed from the team. They talked to the CM and she doesn’t say anything any more (Since she is inactive), but her mods are the problem now. It is just so discouraging. I came here today to work on my projects, but now I have no desire to do anything on Viki. Good way to ruin my mood.:disappointed:

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Then Viki should interfere again. I’m pretty sure it’s not just decentralized guerrilla war on behalf of the mods. Even if it is, Viki should tell them a thing or two about basic guidelines in volunteering.

It’s not anyone’s private playground.

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74

I’ve never been through something like that, but I posted here once telling how the CM team shut me out without even letting me know, and I was ignored for her many times.
At the time I was a newbie here at viki, and all projects that I wanted to contribute was that person as moderator (Do not quote names to avoid any bad thing)
I’ve spent a while disheartened and I thought it was my fault. But after reflecting I decide to continue, for people who like to watch dramas and for love translate.
Think well, cheer up! It seems difficult, even if there are people here, there are also a few hundred who appreciate your work and effort.
And that’s for all the people who have had some bad experience. Be sure to do what you love.

Fighting! :wink:

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75

Hey Cherry,

It’s sad what happened to you, I understand what you wanted to do, it’s coming from a good intention (I don’t know many people who want to take over a drama, it’s more tiring to fix than to begin from scratch so I think you did it thinking that it would help viewers to watch it).

If Viki gave you this channel (I don’t know which one, who are in the story, nevermind), maybe they found your request legit. On the other hand, it’s best to first send a message to the CM (as you did) and the English team, moderators, segmenters to ask about the situation since they were/are working on this drama and if they agree to modify things, ask for their help, others’ help on this matter…
Communication is really important, especially to the current members since they spent many hours on it and we’re a team.

Be sure too to know how to edit and/or to fix segments if it’s decided that you will do the work.

If you take a channel from scratch as a CM, it will be less tedious. Don’t give up after 1 particular experience (you really didn’t pick the easy way) :slight_smile:

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76

Even if I have asked the English team, they would not be able to do anything, since only the CM can delete those empty 1-sec. segment.
I did not even ask Viki to add me as the CM, I asked them to fix the segments and they told me they’ll add me as a CM to fix it myself.
Only thing I did was remove those empty segments and add new language moderators who wanted to work on the show. I did not touch the subs at all or change the time/duration of any segment.

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77

I don’t understand well.
Maybe there were intruders when the CM wasn’t here and they added segments later, it’s really weird. Maybe some bug and episodes became unlocked, we never know.
Normally, not only the CM can delete empty segments. Maybe the current team didn’t notice that empty segments were added later.

Maybe Viki thought that you might encounter empty segments + wrong subtitled segments (dots etc) while fixing, so they “had” to put you CM. And to lock/unlock segments, you “had” to be CM.

On the principle, I understand you.
In Viki FAQ, an ep has to show like + 97 % or 98 %? I forgot the right number but it’s something like that.
And as a viewer, if some see 80 %, they won’t watch because they would think that it’s not completed.

It’s cool that you add new moderators, it’s a way to let other audiences watch it while the other CM is not here. Normally, Viki would add a coCM in cases like that, to add new moderators if one CM is absent.

It’s solved then :slight_smile:

79

The CM did not lock the segments at all, that is why anyone could have come in and added segments.

Maybe they also wanted someone to add anyone who would like to volunteer, since the CM did not reply or be active for more than 6 months.
.

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