Facebook translates users into $
p2pnet news | Advertising:- “We thought it’d be cool,” says Javier Olivan, international manager at Facebook. “Our goal would be to hopefully have one day everybody on the planet on Facebook.”
And one of the ways it hopes to do that is to get users to do all the translating.
For free.
Users are, “aiding the company’s aggressive expansion to better serve the 60 percent of its 69 million users who live outside the United States,” says the Associated Press.
Translations also better serve the international advertising community which has the same users who are providing the essential languages lined up as the targets.
But, “Coolness aside,” other social networks aren’t “crowdsourcing” translation, says the story, going on:
“The move is generating mounting criticism online, where some users question whether amateurs can produce good translations. Critics complain of sloppiness and skimping, even as Facebook says it is improving service in an innovative way.”
Facebook’s effort is among the highest-profile attempts to harness users’ energy to do work traditionally handled by professionals, AP goes on.
But then, professionals expect to be paid.
“Ana B. Torres, a 25-year-old professional translator in Madrid, Spain, called the translation ‘extremely poor,’ citing ‘outrageous spelling mistakes’ such as ‘ase’ instead of ‘hace’ (for ‘makes’ or ‘does’) and usage of the word ‘lenguaje’ for ‘language’ rather than the correct ‘idioma’.”
Hmmm. Looks to us like they may be using the Google translator 
AP goes on >>>
Valentin Macias, 29, a Californian who teaches English in Seoul, South Korea, has volunteered in the past to translate for the nonprofit Internet encyclopedia Wikipedia but said he won’t do it for Facebook.
“(Wikipedia is) an altruistic, charitable, information-sharing, donation-supported cause,” Macias told The Associated Press in a Facebook message.
“Facebook is not. Therefore, people should not be tricked into donating their time and energy to a multimillion-dollar company so that the company can make millions more – at least not without some type of compensation.”
Nonetheless, users such as Murat Odabasi of London, “are spending hours each day translating Facebook,” says the story.
Facebook in Dutch is “Faceboek,” in French, “Facelivre,” and in Commercialese, “$$$$$$$$”.
However, the company is still in trouble over its Beacon, its attempts to cash in on users in another way.
Did Facebook and Blockbuster violate a video privacy law when movie choices made by Facebook members were made available to others?”
The program, designed to track members around the web for the benefit of advertisers, “may be dead, kind of, but its memory, and its stink, linger on,” p2pnet posted, last week, going on that Cathryn Elaine Harris, from Texas, has sued Blockbuster, saying it violated the federal Videotape Privacy Protection Act by sharing information about her movie rentals and sales with Facebook without first getting her written consent, says Silicon Valley Insider.
She’s looking for class-action status and at least $2,500 for each violation.
And that spells trouble in any language.
Associated Press – Facebook asks users to translate new versions for free, April 19, 2008
still in trouble – Blockbuster sued over Facebook Beacon, April 17, 2008
Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. It’s really easy!
Subscribe to p2pnet.net | | rss feed: http://p2pnet.net/p2p.rss | | Mobile – http://p2pnet.net/index-wml.php
Net access blocked by government restrictions? Use Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. Go here for details. Download here.
