Social Networking Experiment Update

After sticking my toe in the Facebook water a week ago, I'm pleased to report that it's going really well. In fact better than I expected.

From a standing start there are now over 300 members of the Applied Language Translation and Interpreting Group. If you are interested in being a translator or interpreter then I'd recommend signing up to the group and to our suppliers data base www.talkbase.net.

Should you be nervous on Facebook?

I've started using Facebook recently and I've set up a few groups for work. We're a Translation and Interpreting company so to get more linguists to register with us I set up a group. It's worked really well. If you're a linguist on Facebook please join.

While I was looking for other related groups I found this quite scary one for United States Intelligence Community. It's an open group so anyone can join. What I can't tell is if it's a spoof or not. It looks pretty official and if it is maybe you should be nervous.

The web is a really weird place sometimes!

Interpreters needed

Sorry to keep posting about the day job but these things have to be done. Applied Language are expanding into interpreting and are looking for highly skilled interpreters to sign up at our online portal www.talkbase.net.

If you are an interpreter or a translator then visit the site now and add all your details. All the work is freelance so you can even fit it around your day job. We are looking for all languages but particularly Asian ones.

We offer face to face as well as telephone interpreting and you can choose which you'd prefer to do.

BBC underestimate cost of translation

A recent report by the BBC into the cost of Translation by the UK Government estimated that they spend £100 Million per year.

The nation gasped, how could they spend all that. Well the nation don't know the half of it.

I work in translation and I recon that the cost is more like £500 Million! It's all hidden costs you see. Translation disappears into Marketing (yes me again), mysterious project costs and a million (500 to be exact) other things.

If only they bought it in a more sensible way and used Translation Memory and Telephone interpreting they'd save a huge amount.

As you'd expect, as Head of Marketing for Applied Language, I've done a bit of work on this already.

Here are the press releases for more information, oh yes and the podcast.