The contest "Game on" is now in finals phase Thread poster: Julieta Llamazares
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Dear all,
I'm happy to announce that the translation contest "Game on" is now in finals phase, and we are closer to finding out winners! You can vote for your favourite translations in the following language pairs:
<... See more
| | | | Kristina Love 
United States
Local time: 17:24
Spanish to English
+ ...
This is the first time I entered the contest, and it went nowhere even though there were 20 entries? Because hardly anyone rated the entries?
This is the first time I entered a ProZ translation contest, and it's also the last.
Some entries got 8 ratings while others only got 3. There has to be a better way of doing this. There should be a panel of qualified volunteer judges (maybe from the Certified PROS network, or the ProZ staff) and each entry should get an equal... See more This is the first time I entered the contest, and it went nowhere even though there were 20 entries? Because hardly anyone rated the entries?
This is the first time I entered a ProZ translation contest, and it's also the last.
Some entries got 8 ratings while others only got 3. There has to be a better way of doing this. There should be a panel of qualified volunteer judges (maybe from the Certified PROS network, or the ProZ staff) and each entry should get an equal number of ratings.
I had no idea this was going to fizzle out and become nothing because not even the other entrants bothered to rate everyone else's entry. I rated every single other entry, and I can also see that I was too generous with my ratings while others were too stingy. The outcome is absolutely ridiculous. And it was all for nothing? I wish I had known it was not a real contest before I entered. Not going to happen again. ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Finalists and winners selection | Aug 10, 2021 |
Hi Kristina,
The idea of putting together a jury has been brought up in the past, and there are multiple reasons why it would not work better than the rating and voting system. Mainly, it would be too hard to find at least 3 members to be juries in all the language pair combinations that open during the contests. And since the exact number and combination of language pairs is unpredictable before the contest is started, the juries would have to be selected as the competition is ongo... See more Hi Kristina,
The idea of putting together a jury has been brought up in the past, and there are multiple reasons why it would not work better than the rating and voting system. Mainly, it would be too hard to find at least 3 members to be juries in all the language pair combinations that open during the contests. And since the exact number and combination of language pairs is unpredictable before the contest is started, the juries would have to be selected as the competition is ongoing. The current system, on the other hand, allows all users who work in a given language pair to judge entries.
In the case of Spanish to English, although there were some ratings, the average rating point did not reach the minimum ratio that makes it possible to select finalists, as it happened with other language pairs that were in Qualification phase as well and are now in Finals.
I hope this clarifies,
Julieta ▲ Collapse
| | | | Kristina Love
United States
Local time: 17:24
Spanish to English
+ ...
Hi Julieta,
Thank you for clarifying. I understand why not many people want to volunteer to judge (it takes time away from their paid work), but I have a couple of suggestions (though I realize others may have thought of these before).
I notice that there is a box on the homepage now inviting everyone to choose the best entry of the final phase. Could there not also be a similar box during the hybrid phase, so that there will be enough ratings to move it to finals? ... See more Hi Julieta,
Thank you for clarifying. I understand why not many people want to volunteer to judge (it takes time away from their paid work), but I have a couple of suggestions (though I realize others may have thought of these before).
I notice that there is a box on the homepage now inviting everyone to choose the best entry of the final phase. Could there not also be a similar box during the hybrid phase, so that there will be enough ratings to move it to finals? Seems like that would be simple to do, though I don't know if it would be enough.
Another suggestion is to simply hold contests only in language pairs that have a judges panel (volunteers who have already committed to judge, before the contest even begins). If there are not enough judges, then no contest would even be announced in that language pair - at least that way no one wastes their time entering and rating.
Another possible option is that the staff of ProZ provides judges, either by using qualified ProZ employees as judges or by recruiting qualified judges and paying them a small fee for their time, or both.
How are other Translation contests conducted in other venues, such as magazines or trade associations? (I don't actually know the answer, I'm really asking.) Maybe there is a successful model out there that can be adapted to ProZ and emulated?
I just think contests are a great idea and would love to participate in one on ProZ, but I don't see myself doing it unless some changes are made and I think I'm not the only one. ▲ Collapse
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Join the group! Some of us who used to participate in the beginning (for my part between 2008 and 2014) have been saying over the years that these competitions are very poorly designed. I can only imagine the difficulty of running a contest for all possible language pairs, but as an active paying member I for one feel entitled to expect from the organizers a more caring, supportive and cooperative attitude towards those who made these contests possible instead of turning deaf ears to what we hav... See more Join the group! Some of us who used to participate in the beginning (for my part between 2008 and 2014) have been saying over the years that these competitions are very poorly designed. I can only imagine the difficulty of running a contest for all possible language pairs, but as an active paying member I for one feel entitled to expect from the organizers a more caring, supportive and cooperative attitude towards those who made these contests possible instead of turning deaf ears to what we have been saying. My criticism has always been aimed at helping Proz.com set up a better translation contest. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Erik Freitag
Germany
Local time: 23:24
Member (2006)
Dutch to German
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Teresa Borges wrote:
Join the group! Some of us who used to participate in the beginning (for my part between 2008 and 2014) have been saying over the years that these competitions are very poorly designed. I can only imagine the difficulty of running a contest for all possible language pairs, but as an active paying member I for one feel entitled to expect from the organizers a more caring, supportive and cooperative attitude towards those who made these contests possible instead of turning deaf ears to what we have been saying. My criticism has always been aimed at helping Proz.com set up a better translation contest.
I agree.
I also believe that this is actively turning people away from entering the contest, and also from rating entries.
I for one have taken the time to rate entries in both the qualification and final phases of most of the past contests, only to see time and again that my effort was wasted because some "minimum ratio" (that is a strictly guarded secret) wasn't reached.
I've therefore chosen not to do this any more, and I imagine I'm not the only one.
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