Is anyone else upset about the new translations

[haylzz22]

Idk why but the new translators are taking away the cultural differences that people are able to learn through subtitles, especially in K-dramas. When I started Viki in 2017 they didn’t do that, you could enjoy and learn cultural difference when watching a K-drama but now they’ve Americanized it all so no more learning for newcomers.

[sophie2you]

You should take a look at the paid subber overwriting thread. It summarizes how many of us feel.

Should viki's paid subbers be overwriting volunteers

As many of you who work on current K drama may know, after over a decade of volunteers being the principal subbers of current K drama, viki staff in the past year or so have decided that current K drama must be subbed rapidly at all costs so that while volunteers are still actively subbing recently uploaded episodes, on the day of the upload, the paid subbers at a time determined solely by viki community support without consultation with the volunteers, the paid subbers start to sub. I try my b…

[haylzz22]

Not sure if the post will stay but I screenshotted it just incase you need the photos

[marykarmelina]

I am afraid it has a lot to do with the already pre-subbed English dramas that viki is bringing to us lately.

Let me be honest and tell you that it was much better when our viki volunteers translated EVERYTHING from 0. It was so special and detailed, it surely made a huge difference among other internet sites. But now everything feels the same somehow. I guess it is something so precious that viki is losing every time a pre subbed English project comes licensed to us.
Nothing volunteers can do to change things the way they were before. I’m afraid it has to do with the licenses acquired recently.

Let’s wait and see how things go from now on.

[shraddhasingh]

Some conversations that took place outside Viki in those old days, I thought others would love to go through these and know about opinion of people we don’t quite usually see.

https://www.quora.com/Why-does-Netflix-have-better-subtitles-on-their-Korean-dramas-than-Viki-and-Kocowa

r/KDRAMA - Viki vs Netflix Translations

Well… but these were written in those good old days when Viki was Viki and not Asian Netflix.

I have always loved Viki translations – they even helped me pick up lots of Korean words and grammar.

[cgwm808]

It depends on the drama that you are watching – the drama may be uploaded already subbed in English, or may be heavily subbed by paid subbers because viki staff thought the volunteers were not fast enough. The dramas may be edited by people who only consider the English sub and are unable to refer to the original Korean to consider alternative, more appropriate translations. Or there may be translation editors who are not completely fluent in both English and Korean. And yes, there often is a tendency to Americanize/ vanilla-ize in the pre-subbed dramas or ones with high percentage paid subber lines. For example, there is a Korean saying “If I had ten mouths, I couldn’t say anything” will be subbed as "I’m speechless. Or a Korean saying “trying to hide the sky with your two hands” results in "I’m embarrassed.“It’s darkest under the lamp” becomes “It’s obvious.”

[aznative]

@marykarmelina

already pre-subbed English dramas

You hit the nail on the head.

[leerla73]

@cgwm808

And yes, there often is a tendency to

I find the same being done in the Chinese dramas, it’s so difficult to enjoy a show when it’s riddled with such poor levels of workmanship.
Ha! My fingers is always ffwding.

These posts expresses my view also ! - Such a pity the thread is closed.
Joongkijunkie’s

@joongkijunkie

I am not a subber, but was interested in this thread[, *sic*] as a viewer for many years. I LOVE YOUR POSTING!! I come here BECAUSE of the awesome subbing by the volunteers. Paid subbers on Nfx are the worst on earth. It’s my thought that Viki is doing this because there is so much whining about subs and they don’t want to hear it. I like your suggestion that the video does not get uploaded until you’ve had time to sub and edit. That’s what a lot of people are used to on other sites, so they expect it here. It would cut down on the sub-whining a lot! I also agree that they need to remove sub-whining from the timed comments. Those are truly irritating to everyone. I cannot express how much I truly, truly love and respect all the wonderful volunteers here. You are all saints to put up with this abuse and still devote your free time for us. THANK YOU FROM THE BOTTOM OF MY HEART!!!

adrianmorales’s - hit the nail on the head.

@adrianmorales

vikicommunity:

an honest mistake.

It doesn’t feel honest at all. What’s so honest about it? Overriding the work of another person, like literally pressing the backspace key on someone else’s subs in order to add your own, is NOT a mistake. And it’s certainly NOT honest. Are you kidding me? How dumb do you think people are?

Also, it seems that @vikicommunity exists solely to apologise for the awful and disrespectful things that its own team does.

Anyway, if anyone here continues to volunteer for Viki, then you truly deserve your faith. It’s utterly disgusting. And an individual who respects himself or herself wouldn’t put up with any of this crap!

cgwm808’s - Well said!

@cgwm808

As many of you who work on current K drama may know, after over a decade of volunteers being the principal subbers of current K drama, viki staff in the past year or so have decided that current K drama must be subbed rapidly at all costs so that while volunteers are still actively subbing recently uploaded episodes, on the day of the upload, the paid subbers at a time determined solely by viki community support without consultation with the volunteers, the paid subbers start to sub.
I try my best to create the habit in new subbers of posting where and when someone is subbing and I try to keep that habit for myself.
Today I posted that I was working in 11.3 of Sh**tting Stars. I worked slowly but steadily and took no lenghthy breaks to eat or even to go to the bathroom. Despite my steady production of subs a paid subber ignored my post and my presence in the part and started overwriting my subtitles.
CLARIFICATION: By "overwrite’ I mean literally that – she over wrote my subs. She was not attempting to edit my subtitles, she was oblivious of them and didn’t follow a simple rule that each language team follows of not subbing in the same part when someone else is actively subbing.

This shows at 4:17 my time, I wrote a sub.

This shows at 4:27 I wrote the next sub and at 4:29 two minutes later I was overwritten by the paid subber. There is a two minute lapse between my sub and her sub.

Here’s the next sub – she overwrote me five seconds later.

I continued to sub until the part was finished. At no time was I aware the paid subber had entered the part I was working in until I was finished because I had no obligation to check to see if someone had invaded the part. I traced her activity afterwards. At some point she stopped overwriting me because she is a faster subber than I am, so I was, in theory, over writing her subs.
After discovery, I tried to post what happened in Team Discussion but viki “moderated” my post and did not allow it to be posted – it has disappeared
I was going to write a pm to the paid subber whom I have tried to work cooperatively with for years. But then I thought I would just get another meaningless apology and the same thing will happen again as she has a deadline to meet of 100% at a tme which hasn’t been shared with us volunteers. The 100% deadline is met by guessing at not yet published OST lyrics, not bothering to look up flashback dialogue to maintain consistency or in Romanizing all sorts of Korean words and phrases rather than researching the meaning in a dictionary or encyclopedia: “Jicho Wiwang” “dosaeng” “jibu” “dojejo” “boncho gongmak” “bongsa” all left for all the viewers to puzzle over (some of the examples from just one episode of Joseon Fugitive).
Despite this reliance on paid subbers, viki continues to promote its uniqueness internationally in having “crowd-sourced” “fan-powered” subs. This is not the viki PR department speaking but the Chief Operating Officer for viki.

I hope those of you who are volunteer subbers at viki have an opportunity to read this. I believe that this post will disappear very rapidly! Anyone care to guess how long this thread will exist?

[cjn23]

Thank you for all you do in subbing. I have learned so much about the culture and language from watching dramas translated by VIKI. I have noticed a difference in subtitles recently and was sad about it. I am sorry that your hard work was written over.

[leerla73]

@cjn23

I am sorry that your hard work was written over.

It’s @cgwm808’s work, yes, it is such a terrible thing happening to the work done by passionate volunteers, of over the many years.

I am currently on episode 2 of Woori the Virgin. The first episode, kind of thrashed around to find it’s footing, but part way through it picked up traction, and I’m not only enjoying this drama, the subtitles are educational, I just learned that Woori sounds like uliui 우리의, ulileul 우리를 in Korean, meaning our, or us! Thanks to The Unexpected Surprise volunteer team.

Woori the Virgin | Watch with English Subtitles & More | Viki

[bilby_z]

Moreover, in my language (french), I have seen a lot of mistakes that are literally horrific!
I don’t know who checked the translation but I don’t think it was a good job…

[iria360]

Je pense que tu ne sais pas comment fonctionne Viki. Les traductions sont faites mais il faut quelqu’un pour les corriger. Peut-être que sur le drama que tu regardes l’éditeur n’est pas encore passé ou qu’il est décalé par rapport aux traductions ou pire peut-être qu’il n’y en a pas. Il n’y a pas des milliers de personnes qui traduisent sur Viki en français et personne n’est parfait donc les fautes ne peuvent être évitées. Je te conseille de contacter le modérateur de la série que tu regardes et de lui faire part de ce manque de bonnes corrections des sous-titres. Bonne continuation, on salut quand même le travail des équipes de traduction. Sans ça personne ne regarderait de drama. Quel dommage.

[table122000]

Another issue is Viki is increasingly getting “English only” licenses for content. These programs and/or films come with content provider subs of varying levels of quality and attention to cultural nuances. Viki volunteers are not allowed to edit or translate this content due to license restrictions. So far, the “English only” has been limited to Korean content, but today I just saw one for Chinese content.

Love Is Written in the Stars | Mainland China | Drama | Watch with English...

[simi11]

@table122000

These programs and/or films come with content provider subs of varying levels of quality and attention to cultural nuances.

I believe this show has been translated or transcribed by Viki’s paid subbers.

At times I see bad subtitles like typos and wrong formatting and sometimes bad segments like flash segments. Some shows are later edited by volunteers.

LIWITS(tars) apparently shows also subtitles in Spanish and Portuguese not only in English. - It is evident that more and more shows and movies are being translated like this, meaning that opportunities for volunteers are shrinking.

[table122000]

Yes, I just saw that Spanish and Portuguese have been added along with English to “Love Is Written in the Stars.” The “English only” has been removed.I agree with you that this project is being translated by Viki paid subbers. There is no Team information, so I do not know if volunteers will be allowed to edit this drama later or not, or if additional languages will be allowed to sub this drama in future.
Opportunities for volunteers are definitely shrinking.

[cerejacult]

@cgwm808

because viki staff thought the volunteers were not fast enough.

I think this is pretty much the whole situation. It is not really about quality, it’s only about speed. We would be faster, but we have jobs and we need the money.

[table122000]

I’m sure you are correct that speed is the motivating factor. I just hope that volunteers will be allowed to work on the projects later, after all episodes have been posted.

[mirjam_465]

@table122000

after all episodes have been posted.

When no one is watching anymore…