[Viki Community Team] May 2024 Updates

[vikicommunity]

To all our moms past, present, and future: Happy Mother’s day! Thank you for ALL that you’ve done, and still do!!

Fun fact: Did you know that 168 countries around the world celebrate Mother’s Day as an established tradition?

Summer Subathon Badge Animal Poll

Thank you for all your badge animal suggestions! There were over 870 responses, and we’ve narrowed them down to the top 10 most popular choices.

Check out the finalists and vote for your favorite! The poll will close on Monday, May 27th @ 11:59 PM PDT, and results will be revealed at a later date. Don’t forget!

Go to Poll

Channel Manager Help Article updates

We’ve been listening to your feedback on our CM help articles, and have made some preliminary updates to address your concerns and bring greater clarity to the eligibility and selection criteria.

There will now be a maximum of six (6) Channel Manager positions per Gold QC per year to help increase the diversity of the CM community, and a few inconsistencies in the progression path are now cleared up as well.

We appreciate your cooperation as we continue to reiterate these guidelines and work together to find the best solutions.

NSSA Appreciation Certificate

Have you heard about the recent return of Ninja Segging & Subbing Academy (NSSA)’s appreciation certificate? If you graduated from either of the NSSA divisions, you can now request a certificate to be sent to you. Read more about NSSA’s appreciation certificate here!

[dimghro]

I went with the but I saw so many other nice options like the .

Thanks for the clarifications on the Channel Manager articles. Many aspects are clearer now.

@vikicommunity Thanks for promoting the new appreciation certificates of the NSSA. Some already posted the certificate on their profiles and it looks great.

[maria_lavendula_77]

Voted for the butterfly it feels like spring or summer to me.
And dimghros appreciation certificate for NSSA is such a nice idea.

[irmar]

Ι’m glad you took the time to revise the Channel Manager path rules.
And I’m very happy that the requirement to have been a channel manager in the past three years has been removed. Thus old-timers don’t have to start all-over again. Yay!

But again, there are a couple of puzzling things which you might want to fine-tune:

" * If you are interested in a popular title that is at a higher level than where you are now, consider asking the Channel Manager if they would be open to co-managing it with you. By working together, you’ll both be at an advantage in getting the channel released to other languages quicker and having that positively reflected on your channel management history."

Apart from the infuriating part that, in the eyes of Viki, the single most important sign of a successful CM - that will get you future CM roles - is how fast the episodes are released, in what way having two channel managers helps in getting the channel released to other languages more quickly? Maybe because there are two people nagging the English team? It doesn’t work that way, LOL!

• Send a DM to fsl_viki when you have successfully managed your channel to subtitle completion – e.g. releasing all episodes to other languages (OL) teams and having completed key languages.

It would be nice to have a list of what “key languages” are. We know from experience that English, Spanish and Portuguese are surely among them, but are also German, French and Italian included? And which others, if any? It’s important to have a specific list of the key languages so that we know which one we have to complete at all costs.

If you have Channel Manager experience but did not meet expectations or if your past performance was not at a quality level (e.g. you did not release to other languages in a timely manner, complete key languages, etc. ) you will need to prove that you can properly meet expectations for the level you are currently at before moving on.

Again, the quick release is the only thing mentioned, apart from the completion of the “key languages”. But how on earth can you prove that you can properly meet expectations? Apart from promising “I will be quicker to release this time”? Is there any way to prove such a thing? This makes no sense!

There’s another, very important thing, that I hadn’t noticed at first, but will be extremely bad news for many:

To become CM of Korean on-air dramas, the requirement is:

Has managed at least two (2) Chinese on-air dramas. This does not include short on-air series

Helloo! There are some people here who are interested in one particular country of origin/language because they already know that language, or are studying that language or they just like that country’s films and dramas better. Either Chinese, or Korean. And they seldom or never work on projects other than this language they know.
I personally know quite a few Italian volunteers who study Chinese in university and therefore are only interested in Chinese content. Conversely, there are people who don’t like Chinese dramas, never or almost never watch those dramas as viewers and know nothing about Chinese language and culture; they don’t even particularly like the sound of Chinese. So they have ZERO interest in working on them (that would be me).
What now? Those people are obliged to ask to become co-CM and then slowly become CM of TWO Chinese dramas (which typically are super long!) only to achieve the goal of becoming one day CM of a Korean title?
They will work half-heartedly, because for them it’s a chore.
I don’t know about you all, but I only ask to work on titles that I think I will like.

This is a bit unclear too:

To determine your Channel Manager level, look through your previous projects and see where those projects fall into the content categories on the progression path.

Does it mean to look where our old projects fall into the left column or the right column? I hope it means the left! That we have already done something of that level, not that we necessarily meet the new requirements for it. Because otherwise, many of us would be thrown at the roadside!

I have already been CM of a Korean on-air drama (so technically level 5), but I have never been CM of one, never mind two, Chinese dramas. It seems that - now that the “in the last 3 years” has been scrapped - I get to keep that level and I don’t need to go through hoops to achieve it again.
But what about the new people, who will have to undergo unnecessary torture?

Not to mention that, to be fair, putting an hierarchy on languages, Korean being over Chinese and being considered more difficult or more of an achievement is a bit rude towards Chinese volunters. Oh, let me correct that. Not “a bit”. It’s an insult. One is not more difficult or prestigious than the other, it’s just that some people specialize, for their own reasons, on one or the other. Why oblige them to work on both if they don’t wish to?

Please change that rule to always say “Chinese OR Korean”, putting them on the same level.

Here is the revised page of the CM path, so people don’t have to search for it.

@fsl_viki @brendas

[_lyla2]

Thank You Very Much, Dear Viki staff!! I knew you were going to be fair and do not forget about our oldies achievements.

[_lyla2]

Happy Mother’s Day to all Viki family members!! ^^

[xylune]

I do think some of the changes have major issues:

The following actions are considered violations of our Contributor Guidelines:

Individual Behavior
Reporting a Channel Manager or Contributor who is not on your team

Source: https://contributorhelp.viki.com/hc/en-us/articles/18459867909523-Viki-Contributor-Guidelines

There have been many cases where abuse or violation can be found by people who are not on the team. Take for instance violations against the following guidelines:

• Using or enabling the use of translating software or applications to translate subtitles on Viki
• Piracy or stealing subtitles and/or content from Viki’s platform to display on other platforms
• Creating and contributing from more than one Viki account.
• Abusing the subtitle tool (e.g. making dots, adding unnecessary spaces, deleting subtitles without a valid reason, etc.)

Even while not being on a team you can say whether subtitles are taken straight from translations programs or whether someone inserted “.” instead of proper subtitles. While some of these things could be reported to the Channel Manager, these things often happen in older shows with inactive or less active CMs. For example, I reported someone for a similar matter to the CMs months ago and they did not bother replying (there were two of them). In fact, this sort of guidelines makes me rather think that Viki dislikes these reports made to ensure the subtitle quality. While I can indeed imagine that there are reports that make no sense or which are not correct, this poses a threat to the Quality Assurance. After all, Viki is beloved by viewers for the quality of subtitles compared to machine translation used by some other streaming services. Like this, nobody will bother reporting anything anymore as they’re worried to violate the rules.

Some other matters (such as multiaccounts) can’t even be reported to a CM since they have no way to investigate. Maybe it’s intended to avoid baseless reports or malice, but community members already feel dejected if they face abuse and can’t deal with it by any means in a proper and official way. Instead, they are basically told to shut up now unless they want to face the consequences.

Not using Team Discussions within the Viki tool for team communications

This is quite vague. In the past, Team Discussions have been mainly used by Segmenters and English Editors to communicate - and sometimes by the Spanish teams. Everyone else uses other platforms, PMs etc to discuss matters. This sounds like I have to discuss things with an OL team on the TD from now on, however, this would make things rather messy.

There may be special cases where a proven CM exceeds this limit if they:

Have shown to be a positive mentor who has consistently guided and led new co-CMs and teams to channel completion.
Have exceeded channel completion expectations set by Viki Operations team.
Have proven to be a positive and effective collaborator with Viki with regards to specific subtitling requests.

It’s not clear what sort of expectations Viki has and to what extent. It’s not clear whether “release after QC” (if you fill the gaps) meets the requirements or how many episodes should be translated to be considered fast in a certain timeframe. Everything keeps being rather vague. Concrete expectations are mainly only voiced in case of KDramas or other highly anticipated dramas.

It’s understandable if you don’t want personal vendettas here etc., but I do think that the conflicts can only be dealt with if rules are enforced. However, by rules, I am not referring to those that may prevent this community from being a healthy and positive environment - that does their best to ensure the dramas’ quality as well. I do think that most of us want Viki to succeed and provide great results in regard of the subtitles and even make the viewership happy with well-received and timely subtitles, but this isn’t only the community’s responsibility, but Viki’s as well.

Remember to criticize ideas, not individuals. Please be sure to mention that it is your opinion and not an absolute fact. If you must, please give constructive feedback

I guess, I have to.

[cgwm808]

While the requirement of management on three channels in the prior three years has been removed, the viki staff now state for Level 5 that the applicant must have managed two Chinese drama channels, which is, once again, a barrier that is solely in the control of the viki staff. Because I am a student of K culture – including 7 years university level courses, I have never applied to be a manager of C Drama. I’ve never considered that K drama are more complicated than C drama so that more experience is required to manage a K-drama. Aren’t the duties the same, no matter what the source language is for any drama?

The revision is an example of old wine in new bottles.

Also the limitation of 6 channel manager assignments per year is unfair. The “short” K drama has usually been 16 episodes for the over ten years. A year has only three 16 week periods. C dramas are well known for being 20, 50 and even 100 episodes far more often than K dramas. The rules should not allow any simultaneous managership by one person, and I propose a one month gap between completion of any on-air title and the beginning of another.

The number of gold QC’s who are active is a number known to viki staff only. If we use the number 1200 (from the number who gained badges in the last subathon) as a maximum number of “active” volunteers who might be QC’s, then there aren’t enough on-air titles at viki to grant even one channel’s managership to active gold QCs each year. The number six is far too generous, and I propose that the number be halved to three.

By the way, my post was flagged by someone and I was informed that the reason was “for hateful” language directed at someone. I don’t think I said anything which could identify a target. Read this promptly because it may disappear forever!!!

[_lyla2]

@xylune

Individual Behavior
Reporting a Channel Manager or Contributor who is not on your team

This is based on the fact there are people who aren’t on the team writing reports to the CM in order to avoid a person to be moderator, for instance. If it was an abuser, OK. However, when someone is doing a good job (even if he/she was an abuser in the past) but mended his/her ways, who are they to cut someone else’s wings? I think they should remember the quote: “Live and let live!”

If someone starts abusing again, CM’s are right there to deal with it and Viki Staff will know about it. Until that happens: Everyone who falls has the right to stand up again and do better.

Those who never made mistakes in their lives, feel free to throw the first stone.

Now, as you see, xylune, that’s why Viki added that clause. Those people reporting have being abusing indeed. I’m a witness, that’s very specially why I earned some haters in the past and was so slandered (for standing up against this “rain” of abusive messages).

This is abuse and must stop!

[zyxw]

@_lyla2

If it was an abuser, OK. However, when someone is doing a good job (even if he/she was an abuser in the past) but mended his/her ways, who are they to cut someone else’s wings?

I think in that situation it doesn’t matter, if the report was written: the evidence speaks for itself. If there is no sufficient evidence that a certain person is an abuser, the report should be closed. If there is sufficient evidence, that a certain person is an abuser, they should be punished. Simple.

The fact that some of the reports are bad shouldn’t cause all the reports to be banned.

@_lyla2

CM’s are right there to deal with it and Viki Staff will know about it.

So if we notice signs of abuse we should write to the CMs about it? I can do that, no problem. Just thought it was considered a bit rude and some CMs don’t like that.

Also what about the abuse of CMs: appointing OL moderators as editors or AL moderators? If you’re not a part of the team, can you do anything?

@_lyla2

Those people reporting have being abusing indeed. I’m a witness, that’s very specially why I earned some haters in the past and was so slandered (for standing up against this “rain” of abusive messages).

Did Viki assign you any punishment due to the reports made by others?
I filed some reports (on other people, not on you, don’t worry XD) and I don’t think anything was done. In this topic there were said many things regarding those kind of situations: We refuse to work for abusive Channel Managers! 😡
Viki says they want CMs to be those role models yet they still give CM opportunities to people who have been reported. So maybe banning reports is their way to “have a cake and eat it too”.

[sheli]

So, I can’t report an abuser directly to Viki anymore?

In this case, unless we have a new language called “Dotish”, everyone can clearly see this user is an abuser, no need for me to know Greek or to be on the team. Before I would take screenshots and fill a report, now, I have to bother the CM and hope she/he is active, because this person here is listed as moderator, and also hope the CM will take it to Viki and not just throw a blind eye on the matter.

[_lyla2]

Of course you can under this guideline:

" Tool Abuse

• Abusing the subtitle tool (e.g. making dots, adding unnecessary spaces, deleting subtitles without a valid reason, etc.)"

In that case, using your print, you can and should inform both Viki and your CM since they’re breaking the rules blatlantly.

Nobody would ever be punished for that.^^

[xylune]

@_lyla2

This is based on the fact there are people who aren’t on the team writing reports to the CM in order to avoid a person to be moderator, for instance. If it was an abuser, OK. However, when someone is doing a good job (even if he/she was an abuser in the past) but mended his/her ways, who are they to cut someone else’s wings? I think they should remember the quote: “Live and let live!”

If they submitted bad work in the past, this work shouldn’t be available on the website. How Viki handles improvements is up to them and not about the reporting person. Therefore, this reasoning is quite weak in my opinion. Not to forget that you can report someone after 5 years if you are in the channel team involved.

@_lyla2

Now, as you see, xylune, that’s why Viki added that clause.

No, I don’t think so. The rules don’t mention that you mustn’t report old violations. It’s about not reporting someone that isn’t in your team. However, I can still report some moderator on my channel if they used a translation program to copy their subtitles, even if this happened 3 years ago.
Therefore, I am afraid this may lack substance.

@_lyla2

You’re right, but I know of a case that no matter where that person goes, CMs receive a shower of messages talking ill about that person. It’s an abusive behavior, so

Why do you think people even feel the need to contact a Channel Manager about some person’s violations? Because Viki has been known for rather slow to no reactions in the past - in obvious cases. It’s rather simple to prove it if for example someone copied translations from a program. While I agree that not all claims are necessarily valid and that some may claim that “similarities” count as evidence (which I wouldn’t really agree on since these programs aren’t that bad nowadays compared to some years before), there were (and there are) indeed cases where things have been simply copied. Reports require some proper evidence and Viki shouldn’t act based on “assumptions”. But that’s part of the rules anyway and should be rather natural for a good customer support.

I’ve been working in customer support before and it was part of my job to penalize those who violate the rules based on evidence and previous offenses. Sometimes, we received pointless or even falsfified reports. Certainly, these were handled accordingly as well. The reaction wasn’t to prevent everyone from reporting others.

@_lyla2

When a CM removes a moderator just for the messages flooding their Viki mail with distorted truths, isn’t it plainly abusing?

It’s still not prohibited to inform a CM about issues. While there might have been few cases of notorious abusers, these cases led to many CMs being scared to add smaller languages to their teams since it’s rather difficult or even impossible to verify the level. Anyway, I am not here to discuss your case by any means. Generally speaking, it should be even in your best interest if reports are only handled (and properly) by Viki as they are supposed to make objective judgements in the first place.

@_lyla2

Of course you can under this guideline:

No, you can’t since you are told not to report anyone that’s not on your team. This is repeated in the report guideline:

Follow the instructions here to report a guidelines violation. Please remember it is a violation to report individuals who are not on your team.

[sheli]

According to the new guidelines, I can’t, since I’m not related to the team or channel in any way. I’ll be the bad guy and will be punished instead of the person abusing the editor just to renew their pass.

[_lyla2]

Well, I have my opinion and you have yours. Absolute respect for that.
Since I’m not the person involved, I’m not going to play the hero or something, so I’m not going to add anything else.

Regarding:

@_lyla2

Of course you can under this guideline:

I supposed sheli, to have that print, should be from the team, otherwise, how would she ever get access to it?

She started by saying:

@sheli

So, I can’t report an abuser directly to Viki anymore?

And in her text, she never claimed to be an outsider.

Things are just starting, let’s wait and see how things will unfold. ^^

[xylune]

@_lyla2

supposed sheli, to have that print, should be from the team, otherwise, how would she ever get access to it?

Anyone can check this on the profile and then see if it’s indeed like that by checking the respective drama and episode involved.

[sheli]

@_lyla2

how would she ever get access to it?

I saw it on that person’s “Recent Contributions” page.

[_lyla2]

Yes, you have a point. I completely forgot about that

Well, I must say it: I’m not used to check other people’s profiles unless I’m curious regarding a project. I’m not into recruitment, so I don’t have the habit of checking subs… I’m really in another Viki parallel universe

[_lyla2]

No, any wise CM would appreciate that info. You are one of those gems we have here, how would you ever be the bad guy? We can always try to approach the ones we know on the team and let them advise the CM (if we don’t know him/her).

What about if we don’t know anyone? I think Viki wants their CMs to pay closer attention to everyone on their teams so… It’ll be harder to CMs when Viki find out by themselves, I guess…

Let’s wait and see.^^

[cerejacult]

“Please remember it is a violation to report individuals who are not on your team.” @vikicommunity can you elaborate on that, please? Some reports are done to individuals who are not on the team, like when we see people clearly violating a rule, this means we cannot report anyone outside the team of our language or outside the channel team or viki volunteer team? Is a little confusing. Can you please explain?