| Pages in topic: < [1 2] | Poll: Compared to the minimum monthly salary in your country, do you earn (net): Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
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Baran Keki 
Türkiye
Local time: 23:31
Member
English to Turkish
| Mr. Peterson | May 10, 2022 |
Justin Peterson wrote:
A proz classic is the translator who chides others for not raising their rates, as if it never occurred to them to try, or as if there were some moral imperative to try.
Seeing as how he is the only person complaining about the crisis in Brazil on these forums for as long as I can remember, I'm willing to bet it hasn't occurred to him.
Justin Peterson wrote:
And I wish more colleagues on proz would refrain from telling their colleagues what they should be charging. It's simply condescending and presumptuous.
I see that you're sensitive about this subject. Could this have anything to do with your admirable daily output (price-performance ratio) and your monthly rent?
[Edited at 2022-05-10 08:16 GMT]
| | | | Rita Utt
France
Local time: 22:31
English to German
+ ...
| You're right | May 10, 2022 |
Minimum wage is not a way to judge income in many countries.
Maybe I should have used a teacher's salary as comparison.
| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 22:31
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
| Imagining a different language | May 10, 2022 |
Baran Keki wrote:
Here it goes: Imagine yourself being a translator in Portugal (not in Brazil), you speak the same language, have the same culture etc. What does Teresa Borges have (apart from her portfolio of apparently good paying clients and decades of experience) that you don't have?
Well, she has a different language (European Portuguese), a different culture (Iberian) and a more favourable time zone.
[Edited at 2022-05-10 08:35 GMT]
| | | | Baran Keki
Türkiye
Local time: 23:31
Member
English to Turkish
Samuel Murray wrote:
Well, she has a different language (European Portuguese), a different culture (Iberian) and a more favourable time zone.
[Edited at 2022-05-10 08:35 GMT]
Perhaps you're not the right person to ask this, but is Brazilian Portuguese night and day different than European Portuguese? Couldn't an educated Brazilian translator, well-versed in both varieties (as they should be, if they're making a living out of this profession), translate into European Portuguese and pass himself off as a European Portuguese translator (alert for the 'ethics brigade'!)? I personally think they're entitled to do this more than those (who's never set foot in an English speaking country in their lives) adding that fake gray native English speaker ('N') sign to their profiles.
If Brazilian Portuguese and European Portuguese are considered as "different languages" as you claim, then he can add two different language combinations to his profile like every Dutch or Belgian translator seems to do. And lastly, from what I know, Brazilian Portuguese is in more demand than European Portuguese (I don't know if this has anything to do with the minimum wage in Brazil).
I won't argue about the geography, but I reckon Iberian culture is a damn sight closer to Brazilian and Latin American culture than it is to Dutch or German culture, although the latter countries are located in closer proximity.
As for time zone, you may have a point there, but there are still good paying American and Canadian agencies within that time zone.
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jyuan_us
United States
Local time: 16:31
Member (2005)
English to Chinese
+ ...
| It doesn't hurt | May 10, 2022 |
Justin Peterson wrote:
And I wish more colleagues on proz would refrain from telling their colleagues what they should be charging. It's simply condescending and presumptuous.
It doesn't hurt to remind these colleagues they should and could charge higher.
| | | | | Pots, kettles and price dumping | May 10, 2022 |
Justin Peterson wrote:
And I wish more colleagues on proz would refrain from telling their colleagues what they should be charging. It's simply condescending and presumptuous.
Unlike those telling their colleagues what they are allowed to say?
IMHO those who undercharge are doing everyone else a disservice.
| | | | expressisverbis
Portugal
Local time: 21:31
Member (2015)
English to Portuguese
+ ...
| I'm sorry Baran, but you are wrong | May 10, 2022 |
Baran Keki wrote:
Paul, I have a solution for you. Once you've implemented this you'll forget about the never-ending economic crisis in Brazil, and in fact you'll forget all about Brazil.
Here it goes: Imagine yourself being a translator in Portugal (not in Brazil), you speak the same language, have the same culture etc.
We don't have the same culture, and both variants can be quite different. You don't imagine how many words, expressions and idioms can vary.
Many Brazilians who are now living here still have lots of difficulties in understanding European Portuguese.
Also, if I am not mistaken, Paul's native language is English, so my solution for him would be to stick more to Portuguese into English translation, and work with English clients/agencies. I believe he will be luckier.
And no, a Brazilian Portuguese cannot translate into European Portuguese and the other way around. It would be like asking a Moroccan to translate into Egyptian Arabic, or Hindi into Urdu (even if the latter ones can understand each other in oral speech).
"Cada macaco no seu galho" ("each to his own").
PS: Don't forget that European Portuguese is spoken in other countries. And Portuguese culture has nothing to do with Latin America. I think we are "unique" even as a Mediterranean country.
[Edited at 2022-05-10 23:15 GMT]
[Edited at 2022-05-10 23:18 GMT]
[Edited at 2022-05-10 23:18 GMT]
[Edited at 2022-05-10 23:21 GMT]
| | | | Dan Lucas
United Kingdom
Local time: 21:31
Member (2014)
Japanese to English
| Neither telling nor refraining achieve anything | May 11, 2022 |
Justin Peterson wrote:
And I wish more colleagues on proz would refrain from telling their colleagues what they should be charging. It's simply condescending and presumptuous.
Justin, on a recent thread you explained your own business model. Several people chipped in with their opinion - this being a public forum - pointing out that they do things differently, mostly by working less hard and aiming higher up the market. Fair enough, but if your approach works for you and you accept the compromises it entails, it works, right?
Unfortunately, as evidenced by doleful comments about the trials of the translation market in Brazil stretching back a good ten years, Paul's approach does not work.
When it is painfully clear that whatever somebody is doing isn't working, suggesting that others leave him alone so that he continue to do that "something" is neither sensible nor helpful.
If we could wave a magic wand to help Paul, we would, but we can't. What we do have is an unparalleled concentration of knowledge and experience of the translation market, but years of sharing that in the form of our collective advice and opinion hasn't helped him. So while people are or were sympathetic, when Paul airs his problems for the umpteenth time I think some exasperation on the part of other forum members is understandable.
Also, surely it's reasonable for people to assume that this lack of success is not an unavoidable feature of the Brazilian market. Others working in the same pair - Mario Freitas of this parish, for example - appear to have clients outside Brazil and seem to be doing okay. At the end of the day it's the actions of the individual that matter.
Regards,
Dan
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