[Viki Community Team] An Update on Editor Roles and Rewards

I think all contributors should be getting exactly the same. Now that segmenters also get points for correcting segments, let’s have a level field, as it has always been. One point each, period (including segmenters, one point for each job).
I don’t get this preferential treatment for some categories just because there are few of them and Viki wants to “lure” them. If they get lured with contribution points, we are already in a bad mess. What are we, pre-school children?

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I don’t think it’s great. I think it’s a MIRACLE! :smile: :star_struck:

I mean, I don’t want to whine, but I just want to say that this volunteering community went from being ignored for years, being hushed and on rare occasions even being antagonised by Viki’s decisions, diametrically opposite to our wishes and opinions… to today actually having an influence on this website and on our favorite hobby. I don’t know about you, but I still can’t believe my eyes sometimes.

Yes, I might not agree with the decisions about TEs getting double credit. But I also know that this decision was mostly made by the volunteering community, while Viki itself was mainly just the means and the authority to execute this decision. And as such, this decision should be respected :blush:

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Well, I haven’t seen anyone here suggesting that only TEs should be rewarded with two points. So, I suppose it’s my prerogative to doubt that this was “a decision that was mostly made by volunteers”, and as such “to be respected”, and I think it’s also fair for me to believe, until proven otherwise, that this decision might be the result of a partial interpretation of the feedback received. It’s all speculation at this point, right?

Allow me to say one more thing and then I’ll stay quiet.

For many volunteers, it’s not easy to be encouraged to ‘embrace this change’ with positivity. It’s much easier to look to the future with optimism and confidence if the system has so far rewarded you generously (whether deserved or not, I’m not here to judge). These volunteers may have found the recognition or ‘reward’ they were seeking on this platform, or maybe they were lucky, but they are certainly less frustrated and more inclined to ‘justify’ what they call ‘a good start’ for a few (TEs here). And maybe they are just more ‘hopeful’ overall.

However, alongside these volunteers, there are many others still seeking space, recognition, and reward they haven’t yet received (seggers were in this position not too long ago).

Indeed, if it’s true that Rome wasn’t built in a day, it wasn’t built by just a few people either. There’s a good number of volunteers who pour their blood, sweat, and tears into this Rome, only to remain a step behind when decisions like these are made. For these volunteers, who may feel disheartened and a bit frustrated, it might be hard to hear that ‘the future will be brighter for everyone’ and that they should ‘embrace this change in the hope of a better tomorrow’.
And if the ‘cheering’ comes from volunteers who are not in their painful shoes right now, well, I understand why it might even be irritating. But very human. After all, we’re not artificial intelligence… yet.

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Who do you think at this point is the under-rewarded group of volunteers?

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I’m speaking from my perspective as an “old-timer” who has worked as a segmenter, subtitler and editor for many years and accrued over 1 million contribution “points”. I never did any contribution for the points or the badges (over 100 accrued over time). Viki is a hobby and I have received tons of satisfaction from seeing something I wrote in English translated to over thirty other languages. I have made friends from around the world whom I would never have met if we didn’t share a common interest. It is true that good translation editors have become scarce but I don’t think their contributions are worth more than that of subber who subs from English to another language. And I don’t think the incentive of getting two points for every edit is going to entice former translation editors to come out of their retirement from viki or motivate anyone to become a translation editor. After all, are the points a commodity that we can exchange for anything else? Sure, we get viki pass and it’s renewed but one million contributions equates to 1000 years of renewal at 500 contributions per six month renewal!
Meanwhile, although the thought of rewarding translation editing to lure editors is nice, it has led to invidious comparisons and as shown by some of the comments here, resentment.

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I totally agreed. Why there’s need of “extra reward”? I don’t understand at all. As Crimac says, we are volunteers, so everything we do is for the public who will see the drama. I have the sensation that we are continuing on the path of create hierarchy and division. C’mon guys, what’s, a market offer? Buy one and obtain one as gift? OMG. :rofl:
P.S.
I really don’t care about reward, but if we start with “this deserves a reward”, obviously other people who gives their job will be frustrated. Why we must rewarded only people who does more, for exemple. Why don’t reward the quality? We already have subhaton about making a lot of subbing, why continue to the path of done more and more and not focus on how the sub are made? Just saying.

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If we are talking about quality, Editors and Moderators of any language are there to ensure it. But, unfortunately, quality is very difficult to assess and to measure objectively. Unless you have a fresh perspective on it perhaps?

I was thinking about something…

What if the TEs got double contribution points only up to the point where they earn their QC status (3000 contributions)?

I would actually suggest this for new segmenters, as well.

The idea is that they not only get stimulated to stay and work on Viki, but also to get faster access to projects locked behind the QC wall.

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Segmenters already get temporary QC status. They could do the same for new TEs.

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Maybe we can let spectators say what they think about, making a rating not only for the drama but also for the translation. I think this could help a lot to improve and we will have a feedback directly from the spectators. Just saying. I understand this is difficult as argument.

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@anto_saffiro_89
If the viewer doesn’t know the source language they can’t rate the accuracy of translation. Sure if the subs are in English and the viewer is competent in English, they can rate the form of the subtitle but the content’s semantic accuracy is not something the viewer who doesn’t know the source language can rate.

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The problem there is that we have no way of knowing the language skills of the viewers. I think the fact that lots of viewers seem to prefer fast subs over correct subs speaks volumes…

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It’s not a specific group. It happens in any role.

Exactly! :smiley:

I think both are important, fast and quality. So, why viki rewards only who makes fast sub? I think if we ask people if they wants to understand something about the drama or simply views it, I think many would choose quality. Maybe we don’t care always, but what we do is for the public, not for own recognition.
That’s true, people may not know English so they cannot say if a translation is correct, but I’m quite sure they know their own language. :rofl: So, if something it’s translated bad, I’m sure they will recognize, as if something is made beautiful. That for me, would be the best recognition. A lot more important than every kind of badge or extra sub.

Hm, I was expecting the change to be for all editors :0
I’m not a TE or any other English editor, so this change doesn’t impact me much, but I think it might be a positive change, considering the fact that all dramas come pre-subbed and editors get less and less contributions

I agree, I really like the fact, that things are happening and Viki seems to listen to us a bit
Now inbox, please XD

I understand the change for the editors. Not all segments need to be changed, but all of them need to be read and verified.

I don’t think I was ever suggesting it, I don’t remember what I wrote in the survey, probably against the change knowing me lol
But I’m not opposing the idea, maybe this will be nice

That’s the problem: sometimes moderators are bad themselves or don’t even edit their dramas.

Agree

I think we’ve already had a discussion here on why that wouldn’t be such a good idea. I’d have to find it.

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You might be surprised how many people make horrendous mistakes in their native tongue, even though they have no trouble communicating in it.

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That is how it was presented in the survey.
Viki may have misinterpreted our insistance on keeping the TEs as they are crucial to assure the accuracy of the translation. That doesn’t mean, though, that they are more important than the other editors, nor that their workload is bigger.

Indeed. But then all editors should be rewarded for that. Either all or none.

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Hi, thank you so much for updating us and listening to our comments. I’ve been thinking about how to write this for a while now, so my apologies for it being super long.

As someone who remembers filling out the form and who benefits from it, I will explain how I view this change and the decision to make it.

From my perspective, the goal of this change is to acknowledge the amount of time and effort TEs put into Viki. It is undeniable that their role is important. From a business perspective, it makes sense that they value TEs as English is the language most of their customers watch the dramas in and it is the language that other languages base their translations off of.

There were probably many factors that went into this decision.

First, as stated, it is a response to the fact that all shows coming to Viki will now be presubbed and all those source language to English subbers can no longer contribute as they have before. This is different than those who purposely joined the editing community (GEs and CEs).

Second, TEs (and other editors, but I will kind of address that later) contribute way more than the counters show. If one were to sub an entire episode by themself, they would receive the full number of subtitles in that episode (from my experience with Chinese dramas, the average is around 500). But editors will receive less because oftentimes they don’t need to edit every single subtitle (my average is around 200 per episode). This change is supposed to reflect that.

Third, as someone who lurks on Discussions and VCC, I remember reading conversations where people were saying that this change could lead to more abusers on Viki. Many people were against the whole double point system because of this reason. Their decision to only make if for TEs may have been impacted by that and it shows that Viki is listening to the community’s opinions. TEs are one of the smallest communities on Viki, and because it requires a lot of time and effort + knowing the original language, no one would become a TE just for contribution points. Again, I cannot speak for other language editors, but for TEs it is rare that there are abusers.

To further back that up, since becoming a TE, I have never made it into the Top 50 contributors per month. The only time I have was when I used to do Chinese captioning and subtitling. And I spend more time TE’ing an episode than captioning/subtitling. If I were only motivated by contribution points, I wouldn’t choose to be a TE, even with the double point system. It would be more efficient to chose captioning. Additionally, TE’s subtitles are checked by GEs and CEs, if they were an abuser they wouldn’t be invited on other projects.

As a closing remark, a lot of this thread kind of reinforces this decision in my opinion. As seen in the comments, being a TE is a thankless job. These past few days, I have gotten closer than I ever have in considering to slowly leave this community.

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While that is true, please do know that there are people who highly appreciate and value you as without you (or TEs in general) no one would correct some of the horrible presubs we’ve seen.
People might not say it enough, but thank you for everything you do here :heart:

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I agree with you on this point. As the shows are pre-subbed and some are well-translated, most of the time there are no changes needed.

As a TE, I find myself not changing much unless it’s titles and addresses.

As a GE, I do find myself rephrasing or shortening but it’s not a lot, fewer when pre-sub/TE does an excellent job of verifying the translations.

As a CE, when the TE and GE do an excellent job, I only change if necessary and maybe to my preference but I can say that I’ve only updated formatting and ensured consistency. So maybe 50 or less per episode.

Yes, I would expect it to be all English editors at first, and then as Other Languages experience pre-subs, this point system will also apply to them. Especially now with the PT community.

I’m fortunate enough to know how to speak and write in Chinese(Mandarin/Cantonese)/Vietnamese/English. Since becoming a CE, my point contributions have decreased quite a bit. It’s my choice when I’m CE to allow segmenters to do the OST (I provide romanticization of lyrics) and with a full English team also my choice to have the TEs/GEs do the OST. The only way for me to get on the leaderboard is if I am CE/TE or I’m captioning Chinese shows.

100%, at least with the TEs I have worked with, we spend a lot of time researching, and talking with other TEs in the community especially on costume dramas.

Same, Sis, same. But I can say you are one of the best TEs I’ve worked with and it would be a shame for the small TE community we have here to lose you. So… you are not allowed to leave! :slight_smile:

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