Archive for the 'Translation' Category

“music for buying dark landscapes”: The Contractors

Published
by
IFTF
on June 20, 2007
in Art, Blogs, Commerce, Music, Translation, Video Clips and Virtual China
. 1 Comment

Contractors

Check out one of Beijing/San Francisco artist Rania Ho’s relatively new projects: The Contractors.  The group makes music, videos, photos, concerts, and apparently can even lead a mean art tour (see their latest video). Their MySpace page is not to be missed.

We are inspired by other superstar building contractors, high-ranking
government officials, housing bureau officials, land management
officials, special interest lobbyists, investment bankers, venture
capitalists, media moguls, real estate investors, internationally
renown architects, construction crews, welders, plumbers, electricians,
bricklayers, cement mixers, stone cutters, various migrant workers.
Our aim is to rule them all.

PRC 外的虚拟中国/Virtual China outside the PRC: child labor on Youtube

Published
by
Lyn Jeffery
on June 19, 2007
in News, Politics, Translation, Video Clips and Virtual China
. 3 Comments

Youtube is a forum for independent media that could never get a voice in China. Low cost cut-and-paste TV news clips, with voice-overs and bilingual subtitles, will be an increasingly powerful tool for cross-cultural dialogue.  These types of DIY videos will also be rallying points in PRC 外的虚拟中国/Virtual China outside the PRC, for discussions that cannot take place openly online on the mainland, drawing a mix of patriotic zealots of all stripes: American and Chinese, right wing and left wing.

"Child slaves, Shanxi China" is the latest video posted on Youtube by a user named daughterofchina.  Her earlier video on environmental conflicts in Wuxi and Xiamen was informative and  provocative.  "Child slaves," however, which deals with the recent Internet exposure of horrific forced child labor in a brickmaking factory in Shanxi, goes right over the top.  If you want a hit of sensational sentimental drama, you’ll find it full force here, with an overwrought, verging-on-tears narrative tone, and also in the news clips of a runaway teenager who had been kidnapped but still didn’t want to return home, but who is convinced to do so by a parent who is looking for her own missing child.  There is an Epoch Times kind of a feeling to this particular video.

The comments are a delicious sea of Chinese viewers living outside of China, and Americans arguing about contemporary American politics, with passion, cursing, and inevitable accusations of homosexuality.  Selected comments below:

[yimaoyunyun] what I can say, we chinese just can’t fight with government anymore, we deserve torture. we deserve it

[fishhead06] No, you deserve freedom and democracy - the Chinese people need to rise
up and finish what the protesters in Tiannemen Square began.

[denbosz] based on what model? The American system? Where the media is controlled
by five corporations and to be elected people need to raise millions
from special interests to pay for campaigns. Where you can be in a war
where 70% of the population don’t want to be.

[xyzshimizu] actually all chinese are just slaves of commie dictatorship..all
chinese should fight for freedom against 1-party dictatioship. btw Free
Tibet, Free Taiwan, Free inner Mongolia, Free Uyghur!!!

[beefhead1984] free willy!!

[sadcow66] Hi..Well China’s Law Is Far From Perfect And Something Should Be Done
About It Before Its To Late And Many More Children Face This Fate And
They Need To Stop Killing Dogs For Fur And Meat Its Barbaric And
Because Of This A Lot Of People Are Becoming Racist. Thanks

[daughterofchina] I know. But maybe we’re too late already. You can not understand how I
feel. It’s the tragedy of our nation. So, friend, please help us to
spread this. Our voice was suppressed. I used to say that "life is
going on and tmr will be better", but now I feel I can hardly go ahead.
We’re destroying our future. It’s not only the gov to be blamed. We all
chinese are sinners. As for killing dogs, I do apologize. But I am vegetarian.

[beadtj] That is not I mean, general to say, I dont see any difference between
your opinion and CCTVs. you repeat the same story that DongFangShiKong
shows on TV. So, Why do you think, you are critcize the gov and the
CCTV not? How can you declare here CCTV is lying and you are not?

[noolympics] The CCTV never mentioned how uncooperative the local Shanxi government
was. The CCTV never mentioned the possibility of collusion between
local Shanxi government and evil businesses. The CCTV never mentioned
when the entire incident first happened. The CCTV never challenged the
responsibilities of the governments. The CCTV never mentioned that a
lot of Chinese are very disappointed about the CCP as shown on
discussion forums.

[beadtj] That is too much requirements for a CCTV, but all of this can be found
in chinese media (another many CCTVs). Nothing can be hiding if it has
be discovered in china this time. Another big step to a opening country.

[beadtj] You are not only sometimes naive man. what kind of a serious narrator
are you? Trying to mislead the foreigner by translate. Seat by TV
without necessary investigate and copy the text and just read it aloud.
Typical manner from a uneducated chinese.

[Hey Lizzy] Actually the
news were published by a local TV channel, and then was wide spread in
the nation through Internet, TV and other media. The freedown was now
led by the highest level of the government. Although there are still
nearly one thousand of children awaiting to be set free, we are
attempting to search for them. As a Chinese, I don’t want to judge my
country. And pls, don’t judge China from only one video.

[classicieon] It’s true crime and we have to prevent this happened again by chastising these criminals.
Before
thtat, we should let that "noolympics" shut the fuck up, as he insanely
roared me, it’s just likes I slaved those kids in his mind.

[noolympics] For someone who resorts to "barbaric" foul language, instead of
educated human logic, we surely know how reliable he/she is!
classicleon is a classic example of a Chinese communist!

[classicieon] I’m not a communist, even if I am, what’s wrong with that? but why you
care my words too much and keep dreaming about me? even if I don’t know
you. because you are a homosex, you keep thinking the way i am to
fulfil your sexual needs!

Coincidentally, I recently posted on Missing Persons websites–it looks like at least some of the missing younger people are probably in similar situations–kidnapped or tricked into brutal, exploitative work situations.

Danwei and ESWN have great round-ups on unfolding Shanxi forced labor events here and here.

The flow of fan translated manga around the interweb

Published
by
Jason Li
on June 11, 2007
in Art, P2P and Translation
. 1 Comment

Manga

Introducing: 漫漫看 (loosely translates as Read A Comic). The site allows you to view, online, page by page, the latest manga (= Japanese comic) releases. The text within these manga has already been translated into Chinese. There are similar sites in English, though they are much more underground than their Chinese counterparts.

The translated text is often traditional rather than simplified Chinese, though both are present. Of the two manga I browsed, one was a scan from an official Taiwanese published release of a book, while the other seemed to be a translation from the latest installment in Japanese aggregated comic serials. The latter fan translation included the usual fine print about supporting the commercial versions when they come out and not selling the fan translation.

Interestingly enough, the English versions of one of the manga I looked at had traces of text that was sometimes in simplified Chinese, sometimes in traditional Chinese, sometimes in Japanese. This suggests that the comic was translated from Japanese to Chinese, then from Chinese to English.

From what I’ve seen, Chinese translations of Japanese comics are pretty easy to find because Chinese translators are quick to churn them out. (It helps that Japanese is more similar to Chinese than English.) Meanwhile, Japanese-to-English translators are somewhat of a commodity in the fansubbing/translation community. So for the series I looked at, there happened to be more Chinese-to-English translators available/interested and so the translation became second-hand.

In this way, virtual china acts as a bridge between the Japanese and English speaking worlds.

Chinese online video activism: “We don’t need GDP, we need life”

Published
by
Lyn Jeffery
on June 3, 2007
in Games, News, Politics, Translation, Video Clips and Virtual China
. 3 Comments

Thanks to China Digital Times for the link to this rather extraordinary video, posted by someone called daughterofchina, whose producers are using the Internet and Youtube as a means of online environmental activism. It would be nice to know more about who produced it. I searched Yoqoo (which I notice is now calling itself Youku, thank god), Baidu, and Tudou and could not find it on any of these Chinese video sharing sites.  It must have been posted there, however, so perhaps it has been deleted?

The video calls attention to water pollution in Wuxi and the protests against the PX chemical factory in Xiamen, the latter which has been blogged in depth on ESWN and Global Voices Online. 

You can find a collection of Chinese videos of newscasts on the Wuxi polluted tap water issue here.
 

Chinese DIY: story of a homemade plane

Published
by
Lyn Jeffery
on June 3, 2007
in Design, Translation, Video Clips, Virtual China and Web 2.0c
. 3 Comments

Our first subtitled Chinese video! It’s the story of Wang Qiang, a Sichuan barber who grew up making model planes and eventually built his own and became a self-taught pilot. This is one of the things I love about China–an ordinary guy can build his own plane and fly it, without a whole lot of interference from anyone.  Especially in rural areas.  The government appears to be trying to crack down on some of them, according to this story of a farmer-pilot from Zhejiang province.  And not everyone is as lucky as Wang Qiang: an amateur Beijing pilot (called the "birdman" recently had a crash. 

For those of us interested in translation work: to do this I used mojiti.com and would definitely recommend it.  It’s unbelievably intuitive and easy to use.  You just tell mojiti what video you want to upload and it does it for you, then you add "spots" to it.  You can get anything that’s on Youtube, Yoqoo, Tudou, and a number of other sites. I think that the video is "open," meaning that someone else could go in and edit the translation or add their own spots.

Lost in Translation in Bo Shao’s bio

Published
by
Jason Li
on May 25, 2007
in Commerce and Translation
. 1 Comment

Alexandbosameclothes

Bo Shao, founder/CEO of EachNet, which was later sold off and incorporated into eBay has opened a new blog.

I found it interesting how much more informal, yet actually informative Bo Shao’s bio was in Chinese than in English.

I don’t know if this discrepancy is standard in Chinese versus English bio’s, but it is an example of what can be lost in translation (and, I believe, how much more story-shaped bios inform).

Name: Bo Shao. Nickname: Bigheaded genius (take in mind my friends made this up), darling (when my wife is happy), Bo Shao! (when my wife is angry).

Born in 1973 in Shanghai. 建襄 primary school. 华东师大二附 secondary school. Received numerous 1st prizes from nation-wide math competitions. In 1991 skipped a grade via the 全额奖 scholarship and enrolled in Harvard, supposedly the first student to do so after China’s Liberation. (Should be true, although there was one other student with me my year.)

Boston Consulting Group. Goldman Sachs (actually only did a stint as a summer associate). Harvard Business School (exceptional results my first year, fell drastically in my second year but I did win my wife’s affection).

1999 returned to China to found EachNet. Harvard classmate 谭海音 returned during the summer holiday to join (wouldn’t have been able to do it without her/alone). Became China’s largest e-commerce site by 2002 (not b-to-b). In a shocking 2003, was purchased by eBay at a high price (looking back, did I sell it for too little? Who knows.)

Because of family reasons (really), moved back to the States in 2003. Watching EachNet/eBay from afar. Anxious, angry, hurt, pained. Wife also pained, scolded me, "You already sold the company,  haven’t you eaten/had enough?" I scratched my nose and continued to change our daughter’s diapers.

In mid-2006, founded NovaMed with Mark Lotter and 肖耿民. In late-2006, founded BabyTree with 王怀南.

Joined the US-based Matrix Partners in 2007 (high position but low profile). Part-time. Hope to find one or two business venture partners in 2007.

Then, his "standard English bio"…

Continue reading ‘Lost in Translation in Bo Shao’s bio’

Memedia’s Strawberry Weekly issue 5, in English

Published
by
Lyn Jeffery
on May 7, 2007
in Blogs, Translation and Virtual China
. 0 Comments

See Nan Yang’s extraordinary English translation of memedia’s Strawberry Weekly, issue 5, now at GVO, for a roundup of content in Chinese-language blogosphere. So much interesting content, there’s really no way to excerpt it.  It’s quite a bold publication. 

Shanghai’s foreign themed satellite cities

Published
by
Lyn Jeffery
on May 3, 2007
in Design, History, Photos, Translation and Travel
. 0 Comments

Shanghai’s One CIty Nine Towns program and foreign-themed New Towns are strange and wonderful things. All are collaborative efforts between Chinese and international design teams.

Shanghai urban planners are trying to preserve the center of the city by not building any more new highways, and by setting up 9 satellite cities, or "New Towns" far out in the Shanghai suburbs.  But they need to attract people out of the city, into the outskirts–a tough job, unless you can create an atmosphere and lifestyle that one can’t find downtown. 

Thus the nine theme-cities, seven based on the architecture of the UK, Italy, Germany, Spain, Sweden, Holland and Canada. The remaining two cities will be "Chinese," and one of those will a sustainable, eco-friendly city on the huge Chongming Island.  You’ll find a short slide show of many of the towns as part of a recent BusinessWeek article on Shanghai. Fengjing is to be built in Canadian/North American style. Anting, with a race track, is the German town.  The Italian area, Pujiang, is to be the largest of the nine cities with a planned 15 sq km and 80,000 residents.

British-themed Thamestown covers 1 square kilometer in Songjiang District, about 1 hour from downtown Shanghai.  It has a lake, a river, a golf course, a Gothic church, a town square, and villas with names like WindsorIsland.  Here is the Thamestown official website in English, with news about the latest commercials and movies that were shot there, among other events (boat racing). Thamestown officially opened October 20, 2006; here you can see the opening ceremony festitivities–Chinese dance performance against the backdrop of First Vision Creativity Square. 

Thamestown photo gallery. I especially love the shots that took advantage of an unusual snow in Shanghai:
Thames_snow

Luodian is the Swedish town. In a great post on Luodian and its original source, the Swedish town of Sigtuna, graduate student Ada Fredelius points out an irony: you can find more ancient authenticity, and even similarity to the original Swedish buildings, in Luodian’s old town, constructed in the early Min Dynasty.  Luodian’s old town on top, Sweden’s Sigtuna on the bottom, below: 

Luodian

If you are in Shanghai, go on a FAR tour of the New Towns!

 

1/12/07 Financial Times article: Alien Satellites, here.

Cross-cultural analysis of MySpace profile pictures

Published
by
Jason Li
on April 29, 2007
in Photos, Portals and Translation
. 7 Comments

Let’s do a fun little exercise.

Let’s compare profile pictures of MySpace.cn’s China and international users.

Note, however, that we hold the international users classification on MySpace.cn suspect — the one profile link that DID work (for me) in the international profiles section led to a white American woman who’s profile didn’t hint at any interest in China.

First off, let’s take a look at the international lineup:

Myspace_profile4
Myspace_profile5
Myspace_profile6

We’re going to dub these as:

  1. Vacation Cool,
  2. Hot Or Not,
  3. I Have Friends.

Next up, the China lineup:

Myspace_profile1
Myspace_profile2
Myspace_profile3

And we dub these:

  1. Photoshop,
  2. Webcam Candid,
  3. Photoshop + Webcam Candid.

Granted, I refreshed the page a few times to select ones I found interesting but we can already draw some generalizations about profile pictures:

  • Chinese users do not feel compelled to present a "realistic" glamor shot. That is, they have little hesitation in using image manipulation programs to augment their picture. (This augmentation being different from using Photoshop to doctor up an existing picture within the bounds of realism.)
  • Chinese users have lower standards for their glamor shot — blurry and what i called candid webcam shots are in.
  • Closeups are in in China. Staring at the camera, however, is not.

Source: MySpace.cn–友你友我

Chinese MySpace: strange crosscultural platform

Published
by
Lyn Jeffery
on April 26, 2007
in Photos, Translation, Virtual China and Web 2.0c
. 5 Comments

Can NOT resist.  Myspace.cn has just opened up and you must take a look if you haven’t already.  It’s almost worth creating a MySpace page.

The front page shows 3 mainland Chinese users and 3 international users, and they can all friend each other.  How do they choose who gets on the page as international users?  Unclear.  But Tom is every Chinese MySpace user’s first friend, as usual.  Seems like there might not be that many Chinese users…or maybe not that many writing in English.  Unclear.

Myspace_cn

Maybe Chinese users will pick up on it in order to meet people from other places; or maybe there will be a Chinese-language only group that doesn’t interact at all with people outside China. If the numbers pick up in China, this could skew most popular blogs, videos, and so on on MySpace. Hard to say what will happen. Some thoughts about what could be:

  • MySpace users outside China get to expand their friends list by…exponentially.  Expect contests for most friends to move to the next level.
  • Chinese MySpace users get to make friends with some really different kinds of people than they’ve met before, like Barbie Gangsta Bitch, for instance, in the US.  They’ll talk in English mostly.
  • Non-Chinese MySpace users get exposed to a wide variety of Chinese people: from serious as in DIck, 24, in Chongqing who wants to meet "the president of every country
    the famous economists" to sassy like Kiki Lee, 24, in Shanghai. Chance to practice Chinese for all those kids in the US now studying Mandarin; chance to meet Chinese people before your next trip to China.
  • Chinese pages are for the most part uncustomized at the moment, but that will no doubt change.  Everybody gets to see what the others like, listen to, and think is funny.  Perhaps some trading and remixing might go on, new fads, new widgets, etc.. 
  • Indie music outside of China gets exposed to the Chinese market; and vice versa.  Possibilities there.