#reliable document translator

[trulinco]

Real-Time Translator Apps: Communicate with the World at Your Fingertips

In today's globalized world, effective communication is essential, but language barriers can hinder interactions and collaborations. Real-time translation solutions have emerged as a critical tool for breaking down these barriers. These solutions enable individuals and businesses to communicate seamlessly across languages, opening up new opportunities and enhancing cross-cultural understanding. However, developing a reliable and efficient real-time translator is a complex and multifaceted challenge.

Real-time translator apps are a game-changer for communication in this century. They allow you to translate conversations between different languages in real time, making it possible to communicate with people from all over the world without learning their language.

Real-time translator apps work by using a combination of speech recognition and machine translation to translate your speech into another language. When you speak into the app, it recognizes your words and then translates them into the target language. The translated speech is then played back to you or displayed on the screen.

Real-time translator apps are still under development, but they have come a long way in recent years. The best apps can now translate conversations with a high degree of accuracy, even for complex or technical topics.

Here are some of the benefits of using real-time translator apps:

Break down language barriers: Real-time translator apps make it possible to communicate with people from all over the world, regardless of their language. This can be useful for a variety of purposes, such as travel, business, education, and personal relationships.

Improve communication in diverse teams: Real-time translator apps can help to improve communication in diverse teams where people speak different languages. This can lead to better collaboration, productivity, and decision-making.

Provide access to information and resources: Real-time translator apps can help people access information and resources in different languages. This can be especially useful for people living in multilingual communities or traveling to another country.

Here are some of the best real-time translator apps available in 2023:

Google Translate: Google Translate is one of the most popular and widely used real-time translator apps. It supports over 100 languages and offers a variety of features, such as text translation, speech translation, and real-time conversation translation.

Microsoft Translator: Microsoft Translator is another popular real-time translator app that supports over 60 languages. It offers similar features to Google Translate, but it also has some unique features, such as the ability to translate offline and to translate documents and images.

Trulinco Translator: A Powerful Real-Time Translator App

Trulinco Translator is a free powerful real-time translator app that supports over 200 languages. It offers a variety of features, including text translation, speech translation, real-time conversation translation, document translation, and image translation.

Trulinco Translator is easy to use and offers a high degree of accuracy. It is a good option for individuals and businesses alike who need to communicate with people from other countries.

Here are some of the benefits of using Trulinco Translator:

Comprehensive language support: Trulinco Translator supports over 200 languages, making it one of the most versatile real-time translator apps available.

High accuracy: Trulinco Translator uses the latest machine translation technology to provide accurate translations, even for complex or technical topics.

Wide range of features: Trulinco Translator offers a wide range of features, including text translation, speech translation, real-time conversation translation, document translation, and image translation.

Easy to use: Trulinco Translator is easy to use and has a user-friendly interface.

Trulinco Translator is a good option for a variety of use cases, including:

Travel: Trulinco Translator can help you to communicate with people from all over the world while you are traveling.

Business: Trulinco Translator can help you to communicate with clients and colleagues from other countries.

Education: Trulinco Translator can help you to learn new languages and to access educational resources in other languages.

Personal relationships: Trulinco Translator can help you to communicate with friends and family members from other countries.

iTranslate: iTranslate is a real-time translator app that is designed specifically for iOS and macOS devices. It supports over 100 languages and offers a variety of features, such as text translation, speech translation, and real-time conversation translation.

Real-time translator apps are a powerful tool that can help you to communicate with people from all over the world. With the right app, you can break down language barriers, improve communication in diverse teams, and provide access to information and resources in different languages.

If you are looking for a powerful and versatile real-time translator app, Trulinco Translator is a good option to consider.

[404-found]

Can You Trust the Manuscripts?

One of the oldest skeptic digs is this, “We’ve got so many manuscripts and so many translations, how can you know what the originals even said?” Really? Tell that to the piles of papyrus and parchments that put every other ancient text to shame. “The words of the LORD are pure words; as silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times.”— Psalm 12:6 We aren’t fumbling in the…

[transcriptioncity]

Clinician Reviewed Medical Translation Services

Clinician Reviewed Medical Translation Services Clinician reviewed medical translation services are crucial for ensuring the accuracy and reliability of medical documents. This specialized review process involves healthcare professionals verifying translations for medical accuracy and contextual relevance. It is used to prevent miscommunication that can lead to serious medical errors. The…

[bts-trans]

250331 RM's Instagram Stories

(T/N: *This appears to be a draft of RM's 'Thanks to' in the RPWP album. The official published version included in the album is slightly different—this is translated in the second half of this post.)

First and foremost, Team RM. To Sanyawn, for standing by me through the beginning and end of RPWP. If you weren't here, the 'timeline of my life' might have looked a little different. To Sehun, for being in charge of all kinds of physical and mental tasks, including A&R. To JNKYRD, for taking us so much higher in terms of our sound and music quality. To Seokjun and Subin, my reliable friends and companions, and observers, who documented this entire process. To Jimin, who left a different record of me through pictures and stills. To Ryota, Mahito, Pennachy and all the staff who were part of this project. Director Lee Sung Jin, Bangjaeyeob Film, Aube, Marks Rosie, Director Ryu Seong-hie, Wing Shya, Kim Hanju, Mokyo, Heeyeong, Kim Ail, Wonjin, Unsinkable, Oh Hyuk, Kuo, Yuma, Little Simz, DOMi & JD BECK, Moses Sumney - there's too many to write, I'm sorry, but I'm so thankful to all of you for sharing yourselves with me, right from that song camp in February, all the way until the final finishing touches. I learnt a lot from you. Thank you to BigHit and Hybe, for making it possible for this weird project to come out into the world. I don't know what it will mean, thank you for trusting me. To the BTS members, who for the past 10 years have been with me and allowed me to reach places I both did and didn’t want to reach. To ARMY - in the blink of an eye, you will be the closest by my side again. Thank you and I love you. It's been such a long time. To everyone who has been together with me through my chaos, or anyone who's simply crossed paths with me during this year and a half before my enlistment. Thanks to you, things were fun and messy and honest. This is also an album about you. And lastly, to all the right people in the wrong place. I dedicate this album to you.

Trans cr; Aditi & Faith

Translation of RM's Official Published RPWP Album 'Thanks to':

First and foremost, Team RM. To Sanyawn, Sehun, Seongcheol, Seokjun, Subin, Jimin, for standing by me through the beginning and end of RPWP.

Also to Ryota, Pennachy, Director Ryu Seong-hie, Director Lee Sung Jin, Bangjaeyeob Film, Aube, Rosie Marks, Wing Shya, and all the staff who were part of this project.

Kim Hanju, Mokyo, Heeyeong, Supreme Boi Kim Ail, Oh Hyuk, Wonjin, Unsinkable, Kuo, Yuma… I'm so thankful to all of the songwriters for sharing yourselves with me, right from that song camp in February, all the way until the final finishing touches, I'm sorry I can't mention all of you. I learnt a lot from you.

Thank you to BigHit and Hybe, for making it possible for this weird project to come out into the world.

And to the BTS members, for spending 10 years with me and helping me reach this place, to ARMY - in the blink of an eye, you will be the closest by my side again, I love you. It's been so long.

And also to everyone who has been together with me through my chaos, or anyone who's simply crossed paths with me during this year and a half before my enlistment. Thanks to you, things were fun and messy and honest. This is also an album about you.

It's been so much fun. Thank you.

-RM

Trans cr; Aditi @ bts-trans © TAKE OUT WITH FULL CREDITS

[genericpuff]

Hey Puff,

I'm someone who has always struggled with how to do research "correctly," but have lurked around the community enough to know RS had a real tendency for… not doing enough. Do you have any recommendations, not necessarily specific to Greek mythos, on how to just do research? Is Wikipedia even a good jumping off point?

Thanks!

Biggest thing, at least for me, is being thorough! The reason a lot of folks tend to side-eye Wikipedia as a "source" isn't just because it's relatively easy for anyone to edit, but also because Wikipedia itself is a library of sources and not the source itself.

Wikipedia can be a perfectly acceptable jump off point, as long as you're actually jumping to the places it can lead to - and you can do that through References.

Let's use the Wikipedia entry for Persephone as an example.

Sourcing "improperly" through Wikipedia would be to simply source directly from one of the sentences listed here and calling it a day. No further digging on where the excerpt comes from, no cross-referencing with other material, just reading the part on Wikipedia that says she was a vegetation goddess, slapping it into an essay or adaption or whatever, and then not confirming it further or picking apart the why of her status as a vegetation goddess through extended research.

Sooo what do we do to find that info? Let's search the word 'vegetation' and see if anything else comes up.

There we go, that has a bit more detail. And from here, we can click the little '19' at the end of the paragraph, which will take us to the References section at the bottom of the page.

Aaaand boom! Now you've got an actual source that you can dig into further, if you so choose. There isn't a whole lot that I can access of this sourced book online, but I was able to find an excerpt where the author sourced Cicero, a Roman poet and philosopher (among other things) who lived during the rise of the Roman empire:

That said, sometimes these sources aren't quite so easy to track down. That's where cross-referencing can help - but that means leaving Wikipedia!

Where this concerns a Greek goddess, let's see what we can find on Theoi, another great resource specifically pertaining to Greek / Roman / etc. deities, stories, and customs.

Though it's not quite as clickable as Wikipedia, Theoi also does a good job at outlining sources in their descriptions. Though Bennett isn't mentioned here, Hesiod and Cicero are, and wouldn't you know it, they're sourced on Theoi as well.

So there you have it! Even though Bennett is from the early 2000's, he did his own work to outline and source poets and academics whose work he was now documenting himself. This means the odds of Bennett simply making shit up are low because he sourced from the preserved works of the era he's speaking on and those works are referenced again through other resource libraries such as Theoi.

What ALL that helps with at the very least - aside from the opinions one could have about the sources themselves (Ovid 😒) - is to legitimize the research. We know without a shadow of a doubt that Persephone was attributed to vegetation and the harvest because there are so many sources across different cultures and backgrounds and generations stating it as such. It thus makes the conclusions a lot more credible, even when they're coming from a more modern source, because that source was built on their own research and sources from the Greek/Roman/etc. documents that have been preserved (and there's still new stuff being found!!!)

Obviously there are always arguments to be made about the material itself, especially when it comes to the debates over translations and cultural contexts, but actually following up on initial searches with referencing and cross-referencing is a lot more reliable and credible than simply taking something from Wikipedia and saying "I read it on the Internet."

As much as the effectiveness of Google and Wikipedia as legitimate research sources is frowned upon, they are incredibly effective, you just need to know where to look and how to find it, and most importantly - how to verify it.

And that's just the online stuff! Libraries are still alive and well! Many universities contribute to search engines like WorldCat which are designed specifically for research papers, published articles, and textbooks! Point is, the world around us is full of knowledge and resources, so the key is to learn how to navigate it so you can get the most out of it!

This is ultimately why it's so important to not restrict yourself to the first Google result - I know it's "easier" due to the convenience of it all, but you're also robbing yourself of the opportunity to really expand your knowledge beyond the summary of a targeted first result, and it runs the risk of sourcing from illegitimate sources or sources that are controlled by Google's own self-interests (protip: have a very specific problem but Googling it just gets you a bunch of automated sponsor posts and completely useless results? add 'reddit' to the end of your search, you'll get human answers from real human beings and there's always at least ONE other person who's had the same problem and posted about it to reddit LMAO seriously this one's saved my skin so many times)

And when you learn to do research the way that works for your brain? It's really, really fun. A lot more fun than public school led many of us to believe. If you learn best from talking and engaging with people, then go talk to people! Participate in groups and forums that are dedicated to the topic you're researching! If you learn best from listening to audio material, then try out audiobooks, they can often be found online through various means (🏴‍☠️) BUT ebooks and audiobooks are stocked at libraries too!

But of course, that leads us to what makes for bad research, and I obviously can't use any other example in this context than Rachel herself, whose "research" is evidently often the first recommended result that pops up on Google. And yes, I can say evidently because we've proven this when she tried to source the term 'xenia' into LO as a definition. Not only was it copy pasted to the point of still containing typos, but it was sourced plainly from a Princeton study guide that is now severely outdated - not the work that that study guide was sourcing from in and of itself.

(notice how she just sourced it as "princeton.edu" and not the specific URL that it came from)

If she really wanted to sound well-researched with the cheeky insert of the definition of xenia linking to a smart-sounding location (we're gonna ignore that it ruins the flow of the comic) then she could have sourced it from literally any of these:

But instead she did the equivalent of an 8th grader copy pasting a sentence from Wikipedia and calling it "research". It's not research. It's a lazy shortcut and it doesn't facilitate any real learning.

This can be seen in other instances as well, such as Metis' design:

As well as Leto, who I kinda think Rachel mixed up with the Full Metal Alchemist character of the same name when googling her because I can think of no other explanation as to why she's a sun goddess in LO when she has zero affiliation with the sun in the myths aside from being Apollo's mother-

(I can't prove that this is what happened but it's hilarious to think about; I'm also low key suspicious that Rachel accidentally mixed in some sources of the Métis people because Metis' design is very... Indigenous-coded 🤨)

^^^ This. This is all bad research. It's not a bad thing if Rachel's interest in Greek myth started through works like Hercules or other creative adaptions, that's actually how it starts for many of us. Where she failed was by trying to sell herself as a "folklorist" and her work as a "retelling", without actually following through in her research. She would often only do just enough to make herself seem well educated on the subject to anyone whose knowledge was as basic - or less - than hers, but not enough that it could actually hold up in a real discussion about Greek myth with other people who are more read up on it than her. Rachel's self-proclaimed "folklorist" title is only validated by the lowest common denominator of readers, who 99% of Lore Olympus ended up being made for in the end, while those who actually understood the myths deeper than their Wikipedia summaries pulled their hair out in frustration every time Rachel tried to make some sly reference to a myth or attempted to speak about it in interviews.

Comparisons aside, the best part is that this research process doesn't have to be exclusive to studying historical stuff! Writing a story that features a disabled character, but you yourself are not disabled and are worried you're going to misrepresent? Search up articles and posts that pertain to the specific disability you're trying to write; I guarantee you that there are people living with that disability offering up that information completely for free because they want to see more representation for themselves in media. Trying to learn how to draw characters of different body types / skin colors / etc. from your own? Seek out the works and advice of those who do have those physical differences and learn from them.

It's about being thorough. It's about opening yourself up to things you may have been blind to before. It's about embracing the learning experience as a positive sign of growth, not a negative sign of failure. It's about taking the opportunity to learn every time it presents itself, even if those opportunities are small and passive. A person who doesn't know is just a person who hasn't learned yet (๑•̀ㅂ•́)و

[idonttakethislightly]

On first reading The Power Fantasy, I didn't really think about whose voice these data pages are written in. Are they in-universe documents, perhaps from a government dossier or newspaper article? Are they a reliable, omniscient narrator? Are they something else entirely? I admittedly didn't think about any of that until a friend raised those questions for me- but while I don't know if it'll ever affect the plot, it's kind of a fascinating topic.

Particularly I want to draw attention to names...

In Issue 2, we get all the Superpowers' full names, supposedly. But who calls them those things, and when, and why? They all move between versions of themselves that are more human, and versions that are larger-than-life geopolitical figures. Not just in their own choices, but in the eyes of other people who are choosing how to refer to them. Sometimes that's complimentary and sometimes not- sometimes to the Superpowers' faces and sometimes behind their backs. Here's how that happens for each of the six main characters, as listed on the Issue 2 data page:

Santa Valentina: Usually she's just "Valentina"- I'm pretty sure we've only heard "Santa Valentina" on the radio, as a figure involved in world events. To me that feels like the news broadcaster treating her as less human, in a way she really doesn't like. She wants to be just a person, even though she can't quite be. Heavy does call her "Val" at one point, in a dismissive way (telling her how her sneakiness with Magus has backfired on her.) She's down-to-earth, but I feel like she'd still rather not be that cutesy and he knows that.

Eliza Hellbound: I honestly don't remember anyone saying "Hellbound" out loud in the comic itself? She's only needed to be referred to by first name, which has not changed since we saw her in 1978, pre-descension. I feel like "Ms. Hellbound" is just too formal for everyday use, but I think it's interesting that she kept her very human first name.

Jacky Magus: He's usually "Magus", but Etienne calls him "Jacky" on his psychic call just after Heavy is shot. Interestingly, Etienne says "Magus?" by way of introduction, and then switches to "Jacky" once they start arguing- my sense is that he prefers "Magus" and most people tend to go along with that. However… I'm not sure Etienne means "Jacky" as a put-down? In that line of dialogue, he's almost pleading for "Jacky" to hold back. I feel like maybe, possibly, it's an appeal to their history as people who used to get along? "Magus" is the faceless cult leader, but "Jacky" could be someone's friend.

Brother Ray "Heavy" Harris": By contrast, whenever Etienne says "Ray" it is absolutely a put-down- a reminder that hey, Mr. Superpower Cult Leader, you really are just a guy. Notably, he only says so to his face- when Etienne is talking to other people, it's "Heavy", which I think is for clarity but also a show of civility. Tonya calling him "Brother Ray" with the verbal equivalent of an eyeroll feels even more dismissive- it's the only time we've seen "Brother Ray", and we don't know the history of who's called him that and when he first started to mostly be "Heavy". She only says it that one time, before she meets him in person.

Morishita Masumi ["Deconstructa"]: "Deconstructa" is another one we only hear from Tonya, and only once. Tonya says "Deconstructa" as she asks if Masumi could be killing cops, and Etienne replies with "Masumi" when he says there's no way she could kill intentionally. Otherwise, she's "Masumi" all the time- as a Japanese person living in Japan, it's possible she gets "Morishita-san" or something off-panel, but TPF takes place in English with the "Translation Convention" trope clearly in place.

Etienne Lux: "Etienne" is what most people call him most of the time- the only time I remember "Lux" is when Heavy and Tonya are arguing. Heavy says "Lux" in a frustrated way, Tonya retorts with "Etienne", and a moment later when Heavy's calmed down he switches to "Etienne" as well. Notably, Etienne is the only Superpower whose name could plausibly be a human birth name- it's a little too on-the-nose to believe he was actually born Lux, but it is a French surname. Every other Superpower is either emphasizing their own larger-than-life nature, or the world is emphasizing it for them. But I think Etienne's managed to keep a name that sounds human as an intentional counterpoint to his hyper-intellectualized mannerisms.

I have more thoughts on side character names from the Issue 3 timeline and the Superpowers' taglines/sobriquets from the Issue 6 character data page… but I'll save those for subsequent posts.

[qqueenofhades]

Regarding "Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe, 1944-1956", would you say you were consciously reading it with an eye to reviewing its technical merits, ie reliable sources, and analysing them well, or was it more reading for pleasure - or indeed, are the two one and the same? Or is it something completely different to any of those?

I read it for a couple reasons, first being that I am currently focusing on Eastern European history, politics, and international relations in the new degree, and second that it is something I am genuinely interested in both on its own behalf and for present-day resonances. So I am reading it as a trained historian but also because I am interested in the subject and want to learn more, so it's not like I'm just confirming stuff that I already know. On which, a few quick points on how to read like a historian:

I admire Anne Applebaum's stuff a lot, and it has earned external acclaim: for example her previous book Gulag won the Pulitzer Prize. This is a good indication that an author has legitimate credentials and strong research about the topic at hand, and that it has been recognized by multiple international experts and prize bodies. Obviously, not every book needs to have won the Pulitzer to prove its usefulness, but it does mean that it comes from a historian who has received thorough and positive peer review on the highest level. I also recommend her book Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine.

Next, she is upfront about how she approached her sources, where she found them, and the language and access logistics. She is based in Warsaw, speaks Polish and Russian, and was able to directly translate sources in those languages; for Iron Curtain, she names her research assistants/translators in Hungarian and German and which archives they were working in. She notes that it took six years to write the book because of the necessity of consulting these far-flung document archives in different places; she has also conducted some in-person interviews. There is an extensive bibliography and direction for future reading. As well, despite the complexity of her subject, she is a very clear and easy-to-follow writer; someone who was approaching the book and knew relatively little about the regions or the major research questions would be able to follow along. I have recently read several history books where I was interested in the topic and wanted to follow along, but the writing was unnecessarily murky, unclear, or convoluted, and which made it difficult to keep up, even in those books written and published by a popular press.

Next, while she obviously wants to explore the problems of these societies and the phenomenon of totalitarian government in detail, she attempts to present both perspectives: both why these societies were initially attractive, the social and political factors of destroyed postwar Europe that enabled their implementation, and what ordinary people thought and experienced in response. While she is very clear that this was a Soviet effort based in Moscow and based on Stalinist principles, she also underlines that it was not just a situation of one-way agency where totalitarian principles were being unilaterally imposed on a hapless population without any local collaboration or support. She explores the reasons why local East German/Polish/Hungarian authorities decided to cooperate (or not cooperate) with the occupying authoritarian power, how people in each of those places did the same, and the fact that the totalitarian project was indeed made possible largely because of this collaboration (and when the collaboration was revoked, it instantly ran into major difficulties). That is an important lesson for the present day when we are looking at those organizations, corporations, and individuals that have already pre-emptively offered their support to a fascist government, and are acting in happy accordance with it.

As such, in short-ish summary, there are several ways to read a popular-press history book: for the analysis of technical/historical skills, to consider how the narrative is presented and the conclusions that are drawn, the bibliography and resources that are offered, simply because I am interested in the topic and want to learn more, and because it has important lessons for the present day. So yes.

[danganronpa-shipping-galore]

I wasn't expecting people to be so fascinated with my Danganronpa character docs, especially since Wiki pages already exist, but I'm happy that you guys are! I was debating whether or not I should make these doc's public eventually, but they still need a few adjustments before being made public.

Also, while there ARE Wiki pages, Fandom Wiki isn't always the most reliable with either incorrect or downright MISSING information. For characters from Danganronpa Gaiden: Killer Killer in particular, there is SO much missing for the characters. But reading through the series twice now, I'm able to deliver 😊

So, here's what's included in these overly detailed character docs that are put into headings and subheading sections:

Basic Facts

Stuff you would see in their report cards, their dorms (or labs), things like that.

Personality

Pretty straightforward.

Character Analysis & Progression

How the character acts in *each* chapter or episode of the games/shows they are in, general facts, and how they developed over the years in general.

Bonus Material (semi/non canon)

UTDP and/or DRS will be included here. This section will include their intros, activities, and outros. There would also be DR: IF and/or Ultra Despair Hagakure.

FTEs

Gained skills, info revealed in each event, intros (screenshots), and present reactions/preferences (screenshots for the reactions.) Hell, I even added my own theories on why they love, like, dislike, and hate certain gifts. Yes that took a LONG time; it took me almost half a year in 2024 😅

Love Suite (V3 characters)

What is revealed about their character or relationship preferences.

School/Island/Salmon Mode

Intro, basic info (for the 2 first games they would include if they are more skilled with gathering or cleaning as well as lines of dialogue when energized vs drained), both story & character ending events, ALL date options ranked and sorted from best to worst including Trigger Happy Heart, Shot Through the Heart, and Harmonious Heart, as well as invites (V3 characters only)—all with screenshots.

NOTE: You may think it's unnecessary to add all these screenshots since there are already Wiki pages dedicated to these bonus date modes, but again, some of them I noticed either *miss* some lines of dialogue here and there, or mix the order.

Relationship with Others

Now THESE are the artistic brushes I use to paint my canvas for "as a ship"—so to speak. Whether moments from canon interactions, bonus material, FTEs, or even merch, I try to include as much as possible. One thing to note though, is this:

Let's say you're searching through the relationship with others section for Shuichi Saihara's character doc, and you scroll down to Kaede, in Shuichi's doc you will see how *he* acts with or thinks about Kaede, not necessarily how *Kaede* acts with *him*, since that would be in her *own* document. It's mostly to avoid repetition and point out the differences/similarities on their own.

Aaannd, that's all! Now, for two final points to bring up:

1. I haven't read the Togami series because it's very ambiguous in terms of being canon or not, doesn't have to do with the creator despite him enjoying the series, and I honestly don't have any personal interest in checking it out any time soon.

I also haven't read most of the non canon manga or 4Koma stuff.

But if you're specifically interested in either, thankfully Togami seems to have translated synopsis info online if you simply search it up, and the manga/4koma stuff is also pretty easy to find. Whenever I make my "as a ship" videos however, please feel free to comment shipworthy or interesting character moments from either source material on the videos themselves!

2. Characters with barely any screen time and/or don't have SO much info that you need to make into a full doc are put into the "minor character" category/doc. But they still have the basics like character progression, personality, relationship with others, so on.

[centrally-unplanned]

それをもう問うたかもしれないが、日本語話せるの？

("I may have already asked this one, but do you speak Japanese"?) No, not really! Like of course I do know a bunch of Japanese, so my level is "some", sure, but I do my translation work through a hybrid machine-assisted approach and couldn't do it without at any speed. I spelled this out elsewhere a while ago (and have a note on my blog about it so anyone using my translations is aware of the limitations) but obviously no one would keep track of that - I have a multi-model LLM set-up where I OCR document text and run them through the disparate models that are tuned differently, and then give the text a quick check myself. If all the models agree with each other, and nothing red flags, then I more-or-less accept the translation as is - when they disagree I go in by hand and manually translate them to resolve it. (I also manually translate anything I directly quote, versus just reading for learning/research purposes.)

Doing all of that has had me develop a kind of funny skillset where I know a lot of Japanese grammatical rules and the like, because that is something you need to know for that task. But memorizing kanji outside of topic-specific niche vocab is nearly useless because lookup for kanji is trivial (due to Japan's lack of spacing and such kana can be trickier so you need to know more). And meanwhile you will have jargon for certain topics so I have studied a lot of say anime industry vocabulary and such. This leaves me with a weird skillset! Plus, If I am doing a "deep" translation I typically have to do a bunch of spot research to figure say what specific 90's culture reference this or that word is pointing to, which is it's own skill.

When experimenting with set-ups I did blind tests between the LLM-mixed methods and my own or fluent-speakers results and they passed with flying colors; the technology has progressed dramatically, and even since I have been doing this kind of work the need for corrections has gone down notably. We aren't at the point where you can simply throw out single-source translations with no corrections too reliably if you want anything quotable, but if you want to read a document yourself and get a 90% accurate read of it with no language knowledge at all, I think we are there now. I don't like to pretend I am uniquely skilled - I am instead simply putting in the work. Others can too, and I definitely encourage it - never before has global culture & history been more accessible than it is today.

[whencyclopedia]

Women Who Ruled China: Buddhism, Multiculturalism, and Governance in the Sixth Century

This book provides an intriguing and fascinating account of the rise and fall of a powerful woman in early medieval China. While the author’s conclusions are theoretical at best given the minimal amount of reliable information available on Ling, bringing to light what knowledge is available on her is an incredible accomplishment and an interesting read.

This book provides detailed information on early medieval China related to the introduction of Buddhism in the 6th century and its political and cultural influences in that part of the world. During this transformational time, a woman was able to rise to power and influence during the Northern Wei reign (386-534 CE) who up until now has been lost to history: Empress Dowager Ling (d. 528 CE). Ling’s aunt Shi Sengzhi (d. 516 CE), an influential Buddhist nun at the court of Emperor Xuanwu, brought Ling to the imperial court as a teenager where she became the favorite concubine of the emperor. Her son, Xiaoming, succeeded Xuanwu as a child emperor with his mother Ling as regent until his coming of age, at which time Ling had him murdered so that she could continue to reign. Ling’s own murder in 528 as well as the many twists and turns of her regime are documented in this book.

Chapter One describes the historical and social contexts around the Northern Wei dynasty and its capital city of Luoyang in the Yellow River valley related to the rise of Ling and Buddhism in the region. Chapter Two provides a translation of the biography of Ling as contained in the Book of Wei (Wei Shu), compiled between 551 to 554 CE and written approximately twenty-five years after Ling’s death. The political biases in this text are discussed as well, especially on women holding political power and how this text is an unreliable witness to her life. Chapters Three to Five then document her life as known, from her humble beginnings and the rise of Buddhism in the region to her aunt’s ascension in the imperial court as an advisor to the emperor. The author also argues that Ling’s aunt knew exactly what she was doing when bringing Ling to court using precedence in Buddhist texts for rule by women as well as recounts the various plot dynamics and cultural shifts that Ling enacted that eventually brought about her murder. As a last resort to save herself, she shaved her head and became a Buddhist nun, but this did not stop her downfall along with the deaths of thousands of her courtiers and the raping of nuns in the imperial nunnery. The Northern Wei dynasty did not long survive Ling’s murder. In the Conclusion, the author brings together the various threads of historical and cultural information which survive around Empress Dowager Ling related to the influence of Buddhism, women, and gendered politics and how Ling’s legacy might have provided a model for the most famous woman in Chinese history, Emperor Wu Zetian (624-705 CE).

Stephanie Balkwill is Assistant Professor of Chinese Buddhism at UCLA. Her book provides an intriguing account of the rise and fall of a powerful woman in early medieval China. Two charts provided at the beginning of the book are extremely helpful: one contains short biographical information on all of the dramatis personae mentioned; the other is a genealogical chart of all the relationships of the main characters. While the author’s conclusions are theoretical at best given the minimal amount of reliable information available on Ling, bringing to light what knowledge is available about her is an incredible accomplishment and an interesting read.

Continue reading...

[birdofmay]

I briefly want to talk about why "proving your diagnosis" to strangers online is absolutely useless, and especially if you want to prove it to a stranger.

I'll use two documents I was allowed to upload.

What does this photo say or prove to you? Well, first of all, absolutely nothing if you don't understand German. And all my documents are in German. This is it in English:

"Diagnosis: Motor coordination disorder with dynamic equinus"

I don't even know how to translate this properly. It's not developmental coordination disorder, aka dyspraxia. It doesn't even have an ICD code. Doctors love not to use ICD codes when it comes to the development of disabled people where I live, they rather describe the symptoms. All it means is that I struggle with motor coordination, either due to brain damage or specifically because of my cerebral palsy. And that I limp (equinus).

But does it really prove that? No, all you know is that somebody took a picture of this document and uploaded it. It has no date and no name and you can't even see the name of the institution. Because you always censor that, that's basic internet safety.

Another one:

In English:

"You are applying for coverage of the costs of early intervention at the early intervention centre [redacted] for your above-mentioned child.

According to the medical opinion I have received, your child requires early intervention because of an imminent or significant disability."

If you know German law, you'll realise that this is an older document because they don't say "wesentliche Behinderung" anymore now. Alright. But does it tell you that I'm disabled and was in early intervention? Does it tell you that there are medical documents that prove that I have a significant disability?

No, it tells you that somebody uploaded a medical document. And that sensitive information is redacted. And you always redact sensitive information, that's basic internet safety.

I could be someone who has access to these documents, maybe because a family member is disabled. Or because it's my job and the document belongs to one of my patients.

It would be even easier for autistics who really were in early intervention and group therapies or special education, and therefore know many peers who "have it worse", so to speak. Maybe I'm friends with someone who's severely developmentally delayed, and they once sent me something that proves their significant disability. I could censor and upload that, and I could start roleplaying because 1. I absolutely know what their life is like and 2. I have the "proof" to back it up.

So what would really prove it?

I'd have to take a picture of an identity card or maybe even my disability ID card, and then I'd need to start a video call to show them my face and, again, my ID. That would prove that I am me, and that the documents belong to me.

And you don't do that with strangers, especially not internet strangers.

So you see, there's absolutely no way to reliably prove your disability to internet strangers.

Therefore, whenever somebody asks you to prove your diagnosis, just ignore them. You can't prove it. You just can't.

[vagabond-umlaut]

verglas

A thin coating of glaze ice on rock, formed by freezing rain hitting the tough surface.

▸ Yakuza Head Gojo x Personal Assistant Reader; Protective Gojo; Insecure Gojo; A Smidgen of Toxic Gojo [If You Squint]; Mentions of Violence [Not Towards Reader!!!]; Reader Is Very Sweet & Understanding But... :)); Lying & Manipulation; A Not-Really-Angst But With A Definitely-Happy-Ending; NOTHING IS WHAT YOU THINK IT IS :D

▸ The image, divider and characters used ain't mine. Please don't plagiarize, translate or repost this. Enjoy reading! ❤️

"Shut. Up."

"Say that to those phones going ballistic in your office, Gojo."

An exasperated sigh sounding in the quiet of the breakroom, Satoru pinches the bridge of his nose with one hand and pours the seventh packet of sugar into his coffee with the other– before he sighs again, resigned this time, and turns to throw the woman sipping tea on the couch, a piercing glare.

"Whoever the fuck you choose, they better be as efficient and reliable as Nanami was. And be very clear on the temporary nature of this job. I don't want ANY nagging from this new P.A., when Nanami returns in a month— Okay?"

Shoko's face shifts into a smile too wide to not be scary. "Okay, Boss!"

This Was A Mistake.

The biggest one ever made by Satoru in his twenty nine years of life.

Yet he does nothing but groan under his breath when you hand him a cup of coffee and the documents needed for the next meeting, a grin resting on your lips which grows brighter when his fingertips come in contact with yours while taking the cup and he mutters a thanks with an equally small smile– only for it to twist into a scowl when you leave the room.

Suguru erupts into a fit of snickers, which turns into howling laughter when Satoru pins him with a deathly glare. The latter barely stops his hands from reaching across the table, to snap the bastard's neck into halves.

The former wipes a tear from the corner of his eyes. "You're wayy too obvious, you know that? Looking all concerned and worried for her— you think she won't be able to survive this world, don't you?"

His best friend's words makes Satoru's eyes widen behind his glasses before he forces a scoff out.

"Don't be ridiculous, Suguru," he says, taking a sip of his coffee, then scrunching his nose from how less sweet it tastes. He decides to pay no attention to it for the time, choosing to focus his mind on another much more pressing issue at hand as he takes a breath and resumes.

"I don't think so. I know so. Have you even seen her? She looks too bright and good for something as dark and cursed as our world of crime. You think she'll be able to stomach everything? Ha!!" he lets loose a huff, shaking his head, "Hearing how bad this is and seeing everything for herself— it won't even be a week before she leaves."

Suguru's teasing grin devolving into one of sympathy, the man offers a comforting squeeze on his palm– not that it does anything to quell the storm within the other man's insides or whatever. The latter gives him a tight smile in return.

"You don't think she will leave, right?"

"Not at all, you loser," the black-haired man reassures, eyes crinkling in a smile, "Just tone down how very obvious you are. You might not want her to discover the evil, but your attached ass might just make that happen– and not in a nice pleasant way— you get it, don't you?"

A terse nod is the only reply Satoru finds he can gather to the query.

Okay, maybe [just maybe], appointing you wasn't a mistake after all.

Fondness strums Satoru's heartstrings, stretching and dimpling his cheeks, at the celebratory sight he finds on walking out the elevator:

You, wearing a party hat a bit too big for you, grinning at the camera held by Toge while Nobara and Yuuji stand on either side of you, two matching beams on both their faces; all the while Maki yells at Yuuta in the background for what-must-be-his-tenth-fault-of-the-day; and Shoko and Kusakabe quietly observe the scene from the side, with a paper cup each of what, the white-haired man is certain, is alcohol—

A call of his name draws the man's attention from the party before to the frowning boy beside— confusion swimming in the latter's eyes as they dart between the tiny crowd before and his mentor, and he asks, "Am I forgetting anyone's birthday today?"

"Oh no," Satoru is quick to shake his head with a chuckle— he knows enough of your hatred for the current season from the rants you have showered him in, ever since he has known you– a shudder runs down his spine, thinking how intense your rants would have been were your birthday in this horrible season as well!— "My assistant finished three weeks of her job here, so everyone is throwing her a party."

"I see," Megumi hums, nodding thoughtfully, before looking ahead at his friends, more specifically Yuuji when the pink-haired boy yells out a boisterous 'Oi Fushiguro! When did you return?'

"Today morning," The addressed boy answers, then turns to you with a small smile, "Congratulations and many thanks on dealing with the idiot for so long, in Nanami-san's absence. We were scared this place might get burnt down when we were told of his month-long holiday."

"That or few of us going to the mental hospital three blocks away and few of us to jail for murdering Gojo," Nobara adds with a chuckle that sounds much less cheery and friendly to your boss, than you told she is on meeting the girl the first time, "Seriously, Assistant-san! You are a lifesaver to so many people."

"Aww, you two adorable kids!!" you coo, bringing the grumpy boy and the bubbly girl into a hug, "I never thought, y'all would think so highly of me!! To know, all of you think so many nice things of me— I am the happiest person on earth right now– no one's allowed to inquire that!"

"Well, you're not just those but our lucky charm too!!!"

Yuuta's voice sounds from the top of the ladder, while he fixes the too many paper decorations hanging from the ceiling, "There hasn't been one occurence of anything bad ever since you joined the office!— Not one shoot-out, not one assassination attempt– Hell– We did not even find a spy— even though there was such a huge deal Gojo-san had to sign with the Kamo's— by the way, it went well, didn't it, Sensei?"

"Of course, it did, kid!" Satoru sends the boy's nervous question a big toothy grin and thumbs-up, then turns to you with a smirk, "Though, I wonder how well my assistant might fare were she to come face-to-face with such scary things— what do ya think, sweetheart?"

Your brows rise for less than a beat before settling down, the same moment your radiant grin simmers down to a minor twitch of your lips— Satoru's heart makes an erratic thrash against the boundary set by his ribcage whilst his stomach gets aflutter when you shoot him a long look– certainly not one suited for a public setting.

Head tilting to the side, you murmur, "I've already read the terms and conditions, so I think I can handle them just fine— Sir."

"What is wrong wi— hey!"

The shock in your tone being swallowed by the loud slam of the door, Satoru wastes no time in locking it before pulling you in to cage your form between himself and the wall.

If he thinks rationally, the man will know there is no reason for him to be so enraged, no reason for him to be so furious—

No reason for him to pull you away from the banquet hall to this room multiple corridors away from the grand dinner party of the Gojo's and the Kamo's– providing enough fodder to feed the gossipmongers and their next twenty generations–

The problem is there's no ounce of rationality left in him— not since that pathetic third son of one of his allies tried to chat you up— and certainly not since that utter waste of space and oxygen went to hit you for politely rejecting him time and again— the very sight of your features twisted in terror enough to awaken the slumbering beast in the man— and make it snatch control from his more humane side—

"Hey," The whispered word accompanied by the delicious feel of nails raking across his undercut jolts him out his mind, making his gaze go clearer– go redder– as he trains it on your visibly worried face, "Are—"

"Happy seeing me turn into a monster, honey?" Satoru hisses, cutting you off and pushing you further into the wall, as he leans down to get into your space.

Fingers digging into your waist whilst the other hand curls into a fist above your head, he finds himself wear a smile, so wide and crooked, cooing, "Or are you cursing yourself for entering this world in the first place, sweet cheeks? Feeling sorry for mingling with someone as bad as the one before you now, don't ya??"

"Satoru—" you begin, voice wavering and weakening, the man notes– but he finds himself uncaring as he clicks his tongue and tuts, "Don't think you can 'Satoru' out of this one, darling— I know whatever your sweet voice spouts next will be nothing but lies fuelled by fear. Those gorgeous eyes of yours are sooo filled with panic– tell me," he croons.

"Will you be bowing out right now? Or tomorrow? First thing in the—"

"And what if I say I won't ever leave, 'cause I love seeing my husband go crazy protecting me?"

Your question reaches him as nothing more than a hushed breath of the wind entering through the open window yet it proves to be more than capable in stilling Satoru. Fist unclenching, and mouth opening and closing a few times, he struggles to choke out an ask of surprise, except you don't let him.

Hand gliding from his neck to his front, fingers grasping and crinkling the ironed white shirt, you yank your husband towards yourself– eyes not leaving his for once, the dewy sheen in those putting him under a spell– not that he wasn't already bewitched by a tiny mention of your name, or the faintest glimpse of your figure.

Lower lip trembling a little, you continue, the same hushed as before.

"And what if I say I won't ever leave, 'cause I love seeing my husband being who he really is— and not some weird warped version, all half-truths and half-lies— Ever since we started going out, and even now, four years into our married life–"

Your chest heaves in a heavy sigh, its softness still tangible through your sky-blue dress when it touches his chest and deflates. You ask.

"What if I say I'm never going to leave you nor stop loving you— Not caring if you're my sweetest 'Toru caressing me with those hands of yours— Or, if you're the notorious Six Eyes, almost killing a guy with those same hands, just to safeguard me—"

A slow beat passes, wherein you slide a palm up to cup his cheek and smile, soft and sure and soothing, "What if I promise you all this, what will you do, Satoru?"

"Will you still hide stuff from me?? Become angrily silent, whenever I try to figure them out by myself— like I did, requesting Nanami to go on a vacation, just so I can become your P.A., to know who you really are as the notorious 'Yakuza King'— will you still stay mad at me, like these last few weeks, hm??"

Guilt pinches his features and twists his insides at the heart-rending quality of your query, and the memories it pushes to the surface– so cold, so dark, so lonely...

Satoru forces out a quivery exhale, fingers flexing on your lower back and drawing you even closer to himself— but never sufficiently close to your love, of course.

He drops his head to rest it in the crook of your neck, mumbling, "You serious on promising not to leave me, sweets?"

"One hundred percent," Your chuckling voice reaches him in less than a moment. Only to grow breathy, when he drags the tip of his tongue over your pulse point— a move which never not turns your legs into a jelly, very very much to your husband's glee—

A restrained whimper of his name pulling Satoru away from his self-assigned mission of suffocating you in love and praise, he raises his gaze to find your pretty lips puckered in a pout, before parting in an adorable grumble, "I blabbered so much but you didn't even tell me what you'll be doing, should I pro–"

"Shhhh..." Your husband shushes you with a finger on your lips, heart swelling manifold when you shoot him a fatally cute confused look as a response. Satoru's cheeks stretch in one of the most genuine grins, felt by the man in seemingly forever.

He bends to brush his lips with yours, lowering his voice to a murmur.

So hungry. So thirsty. So happy.

Solely for you.

"With the terms and conditions all accepted now, it's time I serve and please my lady to the fullest, yeah?"

Yeah, yeah, yeah— you and Satoru sure solve your conflicts happily that night— but poor Kento has to return three days early from his family vacation in Malaysia– only because Suguru & Shoko cannot handle the aftermath of the SPECTACLE made by The Arctic King Of Yakuza hurrying away from the banquet, 'holding hands' with his new P.A., then returning with her an hour later and announcing: SHE IS HIS WIFE—

Quite unsurprisingly, your hubby 'Toru is nearly killed in his office the next morning by his three closest friends since forever– the word nearly there in the sentence only due to your [un]timely intervention. :))

▸ series: tang!

▸ masterlist

[wearenotjustnumbers2]

Do you have any further information on that video of Mohamed?

I'd rather not click through to give the Instagram source views, as it's run by a less than stellar American person who has been caught on multiple occasions using activism and charity for personal gain. If Shaun is the only source, I'd argue it's suspect.

His name is Mohammed Manasra, a Palestinian teenager who was killed unnecessarily and without a warning by israeli soldiers on the 5th of december. Here is this post (the video is blurred so no need for tw). This page is reliable because it's Palestinian journalists reporting from Palestine. You can follow it if you don't want to engage with other sources. And here's a report and an interview with Mohammed’s mother.

Also I already explained but I'll do it again. I know shaun king isn't a great guy and he has a reputation for being a grifter.

Since the beginning of the genocide in gaza, he opened up his account for Palestinian journalists especially those documenting live from Gaza. I know how this might sound, but you have to understand that at the beginning Palestinians had no voice, nobody was seeing truly what was happening in gaza, as a result, many journalists either use his account or tag/send him videos as well as news. I post the videos he shares after confirming the Palestinian who took it, and also because many times they include English captions. I try to translate everything myself but I do have to rely on other sources sometimes especially when it comes to videos. So if you see his handle on a video I posted know that I checked other sources before.

[rallamajoop]

Hi! Do you have a resource for the Japanese text of Resident Evil Village? While I need to replay the game for environmental story telling, I noticed some changes during localization, some big ans others small. Namely the origin of the death flower dagger, or the “christianization” of certain pagan elements such as Nichola’s goddess, etc. I would like to maybe one day hyper focus on Donna’s region. I feel like one can infer much from what we’re given between her home to the path leading to it

The residentevil.fandom wiki, for all its flaws, does have Japanese versions of all the text documents (or at least all the ones I've checked)! You can find it under the 'original script' tab under the 'Transcript' section for any file. It's the one big advantage that wiki does have over the file list at evilresource.com, which I'd otherwise prefer.

Having spent so long going through the actual game files, I do also have text dumps of pretty much everything in the game. That includes a lot of shorter titles or descriptions that the wiki wouldn't have. But they're not the easiest to navigate, as they include EVERY language the game supports, and things aren't always ordered intuitively. There's also some unused content in there, which is interesting but not always easy to identify.

To the best of my knowledge there aren't many significant changes between the Japanese and English text, though there are certainly a few. I've talked about a few examples before: the RE7 text for Mia's Orders document does describe her job a little differently in the Japanese (though neither version calls her a scientist, and good god am I sick of people repeating that nonsense!) I brought up a few more in my post about the Four Lords: Japanese text for Dimitrescu specifies she's the daughter of a fallen noble, the information about some of Dimitrescu's and Donna's powers is framed a little differently in the Japanese, and Heisenberg seems to mock the very idea he's any real kind of noble in his diary. These stood out to me mostly because they're cases where the Japanese version explained things that weren't made more sense than the English, given the rest of the context of the game (give or take some individual interpretation ‒ my own Japanese is not much above fangirl-level, and machine translation is only ever so reliable).

The one other interesting change I'm aware of is that Miranda's diary has a little more information about the Cadou in the Japanese text, stating they're derived from a nematode worm. That arguably makes some sense, in that nematodes can be parasitic, and we do see wormlike tendrils emerging from some infected characters. But it explains nothing about how you combine a worm with the mould and get what looks like a deformed human foetus, let alone why the megamycete itself takes the same shape ‒ and it's still pretty hard to read the whole Cadou concept as much more than an ill-thought-out attempt to copy RE4's parasites into their pseudo-RE4-remake. I'd guess the fact it adds so little to our understanding of the Cadou may be why it's excluded from the English version. Possibly the inclusion flowed more naturally in the Japanese version than it does in English, or perhaps it was just missed by accident.

But since I hadn't seen either of your own examples before, naturally, I took a look into them!

From 'Rumours of a Dagger', it looks like the biggest difference is that while the Japanese says something about who created it ‒ "a delusional former head of the family" ‒ that detail is missing from the English version, is that what you're referring to? Interesting! I can see why it might've been dropped from the English, it's the kind of throwaway detail that doesn't really add anything important, and may not have flowed as naturally without a bigger restructure. But the image of a nutjob former lord of the castle, abusing his power to indulge his whims, gathering poisons from all over the world as part of some mad project ‒ that's evocative enough to create quite the image. Was he inspired to create it out of fear of village-mould-monsters like the demon from the relief on the castle gate, maybe? The Japanese version does seem to carry slightly more suggestion that the dagger was created in the castle too, which I didn't get from the English. Nice, and definitely intriguing!

On the Nichola's goddess thing, though ‒ it looks like the main discrepancy is that she's framed as 'Father Nichola's Angel' in the English, but 'Nichola's Goddess' (ニコラの女神像) in the Japanese? That's the kind of change that I'd be a little more leery of reading much into. Japanese does technically have a word for 'angel' (tenshi, 天使), but I've seen localisations translate '女神/megami/female goddess' as 'angel' before (and the reverse), because, well, we're in comparative religion territory now, and concepts overlap. The difference between a literal god or goddess and an angel or 'heavenly messenger' is going to be hazy at the best of times, and 'megami' carries feminine connotations where 'tenshi' doesn't, so may have been seen as more appropriate for the statue asset they used.

It's also worth noting that the model they used for the statue is actually all over the modern Resident Evil series, going back to RE7, mostly appearing as a bit of decorative kitsch in very-western settings where it's very definitely meant to be read as an angel is the traditional Christian sense (the Bakers sure wouldn't have pagan goddesses around their home!) Seriously, this thing haunts me ‒ I have found it in RE7, RE8, and the remakes of both RE2 and RE4. It's probably in RE3 somewhere too. So I'd read 'megami' as a poor translation of 'angel', rather than the other way around.

It's even in multiple places in the Winters' own home in RE8! No-one recycles assets like the RE series!

All that said though, this all comes with my usual big "I am NOT a fluent Japanese speaker" caveat, and if you want to take 'Nicola's Goddess' as evidence of a pagan religion in the village? Heck, why not? 'Megami' is still totally open to interpretation, and though most of the pre-Miranda imagery around the village is v. Christian (all the pictures of saints, etc), the village does still have a very pagan-coded fixation on goats, and we've also got at least one document referring to the locals as 'heathens'. I've suggested before that probably means a different denomination of Christians, rather than actual pagans, but it's certainly open to interpretation.

And in the same text, it's also interesting that '叔父ニコラ' or 'Oji/Uncle Nicola' has become 'Father Nichola' in translation. I'm not aware of any religious implications of 'Oji/Uncle', whereas 'Father' is very clearly Christian in context. Does that mean anything? Heck, IDK, if you want it to!

Speaking of localisation issues: as far as I can see, translations into languages other than English or Japanese have been done using the English version as a template, not the Japanese. This is based on the few times I've tried machine translation on those other languages from the text files, so we're not talking about a big sample here, but the results look pretty definitive. Most likely this is done for practical reasons: I'm sure it's easier to find translator for French, Spanish or German who can translate from English than from Japanese, but it's interesting that they seem to be taking the English version as 'definitive', even though the Japanese version consistently comes first in the text dumps. But either way, you're not likely to find 'confirmation' of the Japanese/English differences looking anywhere else ‒ if there are any significant differences between the English and other language versions, I haven't spotted them.

On another more general note, I am coming at all this with some real-world experience with the translation/localisation process in projects like these (I don't work in game development, but I am a programmer who's worked on major websites while language support was being added as a new feature), and the little I can tell you is that translating something of that scale can be a heckuva chaotic process. You don't want to leave all the translations to be done at the last minute before release, because it can be a huge job ‒ and I know Capcom has English-speaking staff, so getting things translated into English as they're written (or even written first in English and translated into Japanese) is bound to be a priority.

But at the same time, things get re-written all the time during development. Maybe we've changed our minds about some story or technical detail. Maybe we've spotted an error. Maybe the text is slightly too long. Which can be a major headache, if every minor change might need to be translated into multiple other languages, and/or checked by multiple different people to make sure it makes sense in context. A lot of minor details will also likely get dropped or embellished during the translation process, either due to misunderstandings or just because producing something which sounds natural in the target language is usually better than wording that is technically correct but linguistically awkward.

So tl;dr: small differences between localisations are bound to happen, and are absolutely grounds for over-analysis, if you're so inclined. Who knows what else might be buried in all those files?

[qsplaylist]

Is Convenience Our Crutch? A Human’s Weapon against the Machine Mind. 

Reclaiming our ability to think

“Why is my writing getting worse?” I groaned as I stared at a blank Google Document. 

Well, it wasn’t blank. Not two minutes before. I had written out a messy outline, deleted it, rewrote it, reworded it, hated it, and you probably know how the rest went. I ended up with a completely blank Google Document, an unplanned essay, and no direction for my writing whatsoever. I have always prided myself in my ability to not only write, but write well, so what was happening? Why was I grasping at straws, unsure how to formulate any opinion on the prompt that I was given, and generally stuck? 

When I started this new school year with harder classes, teachers, assignments…harder everything, writing essays had become less about writing and more about fulfilling a certain standard that the teacher wanted me to follow. The topic needed to add to the discussion, not be something that was easily found by just searching it up on the internet. It needed to use complex language. It needed to argue well. It needed to use different sentence structures. Show not tell, but also use the specific writing term if necessary. No writing “logos,” “pathos,” or “ethos”. Abandon those five-paragraph essay structures. On and on, these guidelines that were supposed to make my writing more personal, more stylistic, more me, became burdensome restrictions that made me scared to write. 

Or, at least, that is what I wanted myself to think. As a perfectionist, I criticized myself for my inability to write well when, in reality, I just couldn’t write well instantly. I had spent two hours writing a draft and, to my astonishment, it did not sound like a revolutionary, never-heard-before opinion essay about the Crucible. Crazy, I know! So, I became reliant on the resources around me, things that will give me instant answers to whatever I was writing about. Looking up what other people have said about what I was arguing became looking up what to say about the topic I need to write about. And from that, using AI technologies for writing became more and more tempting. 

I found a loophole in my own thinking, where I realized that I didn’t have to really use the AI to write my essays for me. I could keep my moral high-ground by just writing most of it by myself, and asking them to “improve” my writing. Grammarly or whatever platform would then provide me a mediocre regurgitation of my ideas, and I truly thought that I had accomplished something. I didn’t use it to write my whole essay, necessarily. Technically, I was still writing my own essay. It was just improving the ideas I already had. Right? 

The danger of modern technology isn't just the sheer amount of distraction it creates—though that is a factor—but also our growing dependence on it. This dependence is not surprising at all. The internet is a wealth of knowledge and all the tools on there are just so reliable, so quickly accessible. Don’t know something? Just google it. Can’t find where something is inside a store? Just order it online. Don’t remember how to say “can I have a can of apple cider” in Spanish? Just translate it. 

But, this convenience comes at a cost, and I have felt this cost personally. I have become so consumed by needing to be good, and good right away, that this dependence emerged easily. I found myself so insistent on getting a beautiful masterpiece of an outline right away that I did not even think to put in the time to think and reflect. I could easily have taken a few minutes, or even a few days, to ponder about the prompt, to think. Not just with essays, but with everything else in life as well. Do I think about the material I read, or do I just search up an explanation for the things I don’t know? Do I try to solve a problem, even when I have gotten it wrong a million times before, or do I just give and search for the answer? Do I check if the AI generated answer at the top of the search results is accurate, or do I just trust what it says because I’m too tired to bother looking through the tens of other articles about the stuff I search? But no, I wanted the beautiful essay right away, those answers right away, that elegance and eloquence and the careful mincing of words right away. And the internet provided me with just that: elegance and eloquence, and a whole lot of nothing.  

Then I find myself asking, on those days of self-reflection and rare lucidness, whether or not I actually know anything at all. And, perhaps, this question applies to you as well. When we learn something, do we truly internalize it, or do we prioritize convenience, knowing we can always look it up later? Not just look it up, but access it instantly, effortlessly. Our habits have shifted toward "googling" everything, which is remarkable, but what does this instant access to information do to our critical thinking, memorization, and willingness to deeply learn? And why do we resort to these options in the first place? 

I think the answer is the cultural norm of wanting everything quickly. Efficiency, productivity; this culture has pushed everything to be as quick as possible, the most product with the least amount of time and effort. I’m not saying productivity is bad; rather I believe that this mindset has permeated into other aspects of life as well. We lose our patience when reading a book because the information isn’t presented to us right away. We grow frustrated at the recipe when it starts with a sob story about some guy’s grandma. We become irritated when the perfect essay idea or writing does not emerge right away. 

I’m not totally clear what this impact is, at least not in terms of statistics, numbers, or experiments. But, one thing is for sure: we have to keep thinking. No matter what topic it’s about, try not to rely on “searching it up” as the first resort. When writing an essay, maybe don’t search for topics right away, or even have generative technology refine what you write. At least not right away. Try to think about the topic yourself, ponder about it. In writing this post, I spent a lot of time thinking and reflecting. I wrote many drafts, deleted several paragraphs, and ignored this document completely for several weeks. 

Refine the art of taking your time to think. If you took the time to read through this insanity-style block of text, I applaud you for taking this first step. Thinking will be your sword, and patience your shield. Unlike what society (or our brain) tells us, not everything has to be instant. Knowledge, understanding, outcomes do not have to be instant, even if some of them can be. Think, wonder, ponder. Abandon searching up the answer right away. Think, wonder, ponder. This, I found, is our weapon against technological dependence.

[the-pagan-crow]

Where to Begin?

I was thinking about how daunting it can feel when you first dip your toes into the world of heathenry. We don't believe there's a one size fits all answer, but we're going to hopefully provide some beginner advice and resources! Always remember to do what works for you!!

Things to Consider

Learning isn't the same for everyone, so what might work for us might not work for you. This is why it's so important to consider how you're best going to absorb information. Below are some questions to ask yourself before diving too deep into research!

Am I am auditory learner?

Am I a visual learner?

Do I need pictures or other exciting elements to keep me engaged?

Can I focus on difficult texts without getting distracted?

What is my general reading level?

What knowledge do I already have?

What kind of things do I want to prioritize learning?

What resources will I have access to?

However you answer these questions is fine, there's no right or wrong! However, these should help guide you when selecting resources, especially starting off.

Another thing to consider is where you're going to keep notes. Whether this is a virtual document, a notebook, flashcards, or something else, keeping notes will help immensely!! Don't make our mistake of not taking notes and having to do the research all over.

One final consideration that I think is often overlooked but extremely important: do you have anyone who you can talk about your research with? I'm not saying to find a "coven" or group of some sort, but being able to talk about what you're learning can really help retention of information and will help you stay motivated.

Resources

Below are some resources, please note:

We are not affiliated with any of these links. We may not even like the whole website or everything the author says. IT IS ALWAYS IMPORTANT to use critical thinking, to cross reference, and to utilize more than one source!

This should be used as a starting point!

We like the episodes we've listened to of this podcast!! If you can learn through audio only, it's great to have on in the car!

We've used this website for years! Very good information, though the writing style may be difficult for people who struggle reading text that is more academic in format.

Also a good site! More relaxed in tone, but still full of information!

We have yet to watch any of Crawford's videos. However, we're reading his translation of the Poetic Edda now, and he is a highly recommended scholar!

Hopefully some of this can help you! Always do what works in your life! We are but one heathen, and we don't know everything. Learning is a process. If you'd like to reach out to us, please feel free!!

Happy Learning!