Too many times it has happened that a project is completely finished and released to OL languages, after which a segmenter goes in to edit the segments (add, extend, shorten).
The problem isn’t editing itself. The problem is not notifying other members of the team about it. Segmenter notifying the CM and, in turn, CM notifying Moderators.
The quality of segments on Viki has significantly increased over the last 5 years or so. I completely understand the need to modernize and update the segments of old dramas.
But, if this is an finished project, a Moderator will not go back to check their translations on a regular basis. Why would they?
If a project is old (a few years or more), the CM might also be inactive. If a segmenter at this point decides to edit the segments, then obviously they didn’t do it with the permission of a CM. Which is again fine, as long as they notify the rest of the team.
A recent check showed me that on one of the episodes of a series finished 6 years ago, 10% of new segments were added. It was enough to place the drama into Viki’s Project Finder again. One has to wonder if that was really necessary. But, above all, how much time can it cost to send a message to Moderators, saying the segments have been edited and can the Moderators edit the subs again?
Actually, scratch that. If such large changes in segments are planned, they should definitely be discussed with the CM and be announced to others in the team in advance (because at this point the project is re-opened again). So that Moderators have time to plan when they’re going to edit the whole series again.
I don’t know the situation, but from the moment it is done, the CM should know and has agreed at least. Maybe the CM knows or not and has agreed or not, and the communication phase has been skipped with others.
After, for the person who does the communication to all teams: it depends on the team organization, because they have to give timing and not every CM or editor will take care of that.
In that case, someone else could be picked as a substitute and tell others.
For me, the most important thing is that the communication is done correctly. That it comes from the CM or chief segger or the segmenter who fixed, not very important.
But they have to pick someone who will tell.
Legitimately or no:
There are projects it is legitimate to do them again, because it was done by people who never did a segmenting program so we can imagine the result.
It is the same for English subtitling or editing when subtitlers begin to tell their own opinion in the subs, or because of this segmenting fix.
How it can happen:
ignorance from either CM, either people appointed segmenters but didn’t do the segging program before, either mods (new mods)
or I-don’t-care approach from everyone in the team, which is why mods didn’t tell anything or no reaction.
or speed was privileged and no quality check or little.
Normally, when we subtitle or watch the drama, in the case of missing subtitles (a consequent number is missing or strange skip in the subs), we can tell normally.
It would be weird that no one in the team couldn’t tell, except if it’s in the listed cases above.
Throughout the years it has been several dramas where this has happened. That’s why I felt the need to write this post.
As I said, I usually don’t go back to my finished projects to check if someone has been fixing stuff. We all have better things to do than to check up on our finished work. But yesterday I was checking out how the Project Finder is working and found in it a drama we thought we completed. That’s why I started checking some of my other dramas. And, indeed, a few have also been edited. In one of them some segments were way too long. But then they should have let others know what they did.
Yes, communication.
You must be one of the few who check.
Normally, CM or the segmenter posts in Team Discussion and/or sends a PM.
Even when a message is sent, not every moderator is going to change from what I have seen.
It also happened that new subbers without mods were more diligent in changing stuff according to the notification than mods with experience.
I am pretty sure all changes made on English subs or segging will not be reflected in some languages, not because some volunteers were not informed.
I also think that if a good number of subs is missing, it’s better to change than not change because some mods might be absent. Not because they are absent that we have to adapt to them and downgrade the quality or let missing subs stay at it is. It is not fair for the show or the audience.
And could recruit subbers or editors or contact the subbers already in the team if the mod is absent to change the edited subs.
On a very very old drama, I became the Channel Manager and changed the segments and the subs and added the OST to the series. When I first took Seg 101 in 2010. we were told not to segment reviews, previews and OST. I put a change to that and started segging reviews, previews and OST and that became the norm at viki.
I became the CM of My Lovely Kim Sam Soon in 2014, 10 years after the original broadcast and added segments for the OST. The drama was broadcast before there was a vikii or viki in 2004. So it was “old” when it first came to viki. At the time I re-did the entire drama, I also recruited some help to fill in missing dialogue and adjusted the segments to make them longer because the segments were poorly cut, out of synch and generally not good – Kim Sam Soon was uploaded at a time when very often the subbers segmented as they subbed. I also added consistency to the character name spelling. The work I did was about several years after the original subbing on viki. I didn’t have to inform the Channel Manager because that was me! Later on I was asked by the Channel Manager for City Hall to add the OST. And in the past I’ve also been asked by a Channel Manager on a beloved old drama to adjust the segments because they were totally out of synch and to fill in missing subs.
But what I did I think can be distinguished from the abusers who sometimes sneak in and put in thousands of segments into a single episode, or replacement channel managers who find an old channel, put their names everywhere and remove the credits for the original subbers and have never subbed in a real language or have ever been trained as a segmenter. I do know that some language moderators have gone back to fill in the blanks for their subs. The drama is a classic and I am so happy it is still on viki and still making people happy.
That was surely an excellent thing to do, and I don’t think anybody would have anything to say about it. And I am sure we all know that there are some dramas where changes must be made. We’ve all seen examples of those, and everyone is surely grateful to those who take on this boring task.
The whole point of the Original Post, however, was whether the Other Language moderators are informed when anyone makes substantial changes (other than moving the starting and ending point or adding a little extension). It seems that in some dramas nobody takes the trouble to post a simple message to let them know.
Then it’s their choice whether to also update their language or not, but at least they should know.
Once I was CM of an old classic film where many languages were already done years ago, but the segments were really terrible, very short etc. so I had to do lots of joining.
I wrote the old contributors, none of them replied. I understood that nobody would help. Many of them were not even on Viki anymore.
I saved all the language subs on a separate sheet and then recopied what needed to be recopied, splitting, joining or whatever. That’s why on my profile you will see contributions (and even early badges) in several languages I clearly don’t know!