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Alert: My business name is being used without permission by a fraudulent website

Alert

The website vancouverctv dot com is using my business name without my permission (and until yesterday morning, knowlegdge), along with some random and thankfully incoherent excerpts taken from my website. Thanks to Google Alerts I was alerted immediately about this webpage. My business name, which is used on the aforementioned site without my permission, has been and is registered in the State of California, United States of America, since 2010. Finally, the illegal use of copyrighted excerpts from my website violate the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

On the same page (see screenshots below), highly unethical academic paper writing services are advertised, that is, a website is advertised, where students can pay for somebody else to write their term papers or other homework for them. This practice is not only unethical, it also constitutes fraud. I have absolutely nothing to do with these academic paper writing services or that website.

I am in the process of consulting with a lawyer on how to proceed in terms of legal action against the aforementioned fraudulent website, unless they immediately remove my business name.

Unethical impostor vancouverctv

Unethical website using my business name without permission.


Unethical impostor vancouverctv

Unethical website using my business name without permission, 2nd screenshot.

Patent terminology search with Google Patents

In the following I will explain how to use Google Patents to search for patents that have been filed in two different languages for terminology research. To some extent, the same goal can of course be achieved with an Espacenet search (Espacenet is the database of the European Patent Office, EPO) or a search of other patent databases by other patent offices. However, I found Google Patents the best search engine for full text searches. As far as I know, it is also the only search engine that can simultaneously display paragraphs in two languages. More on that below.

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Google Alerts

Google is one of the most-used search engines of the world. Aside from its search engine, Google offers a variety of other well-known services. However, there’s a very useful service that is relatively unknown: Google Alerts.

What are Google Alerts?

Google Alerts allow you to set up automatic email notifications whenever new entries are added to the top search results for the specific search term or keyword that you are asking Google Alerts to monitor.

Why should I use Google Alerts?

  • To monitor your online reputation: Everybody should care about their online reputation. If you are self-employed and/or a small business owner, you should care even more, because chances are, that the majority of your clients searches you online at some point. In this day and age of impersonation scams and identity theft, it is even more important to regularly check your online presence. If you set up a Google Alert with your name (and some variations), Google will do that for you.
  • To stay abreast of topics that interest you: Most of us are subscribed to email lists, RSS feeds, blogs, etc. But how will you hear about a new online news source on an interesting topic that is not yet on the radar of these standard sources? Google Alerts can help.
  • To research sectors and industries: Be it for investment purposes, to find new clients, to monitor the competition, or simply to stay on top of developments in the sector you are working in, Google Alerts can be useful if you pick the right search terms.
  • To follow important people: Just set up an alert with their name, and you’re all set.

How do I set up a Google Alert?

Setting up a Google Alert.

Setting up a Google Alert.

  1. Go to http://www.google.com/alerts/. You don’t even have to have a Google account.
  2. If you have a Google account, sign in. If you don’t, proceed with the next step.
  3. Enter the search term you want to monitor.
  4. Select the desired options in terms of delivery, frequency, language, etc.
  5. Enter your email address if you don’t have a Google account.
  6. Click on “Create Alert.”

That’s it!

Scam alert!!!!!

An outfit called “Alliance of Applied Translators and Interpreters International”, AATII, has illegally acquired the publicly available information and names of thousands of translators and interpreters from various reputable directories, such as the ATA directory, and is using this information list the translators and interpreters without their consent on their site. My name and information was stolen as well without my knowledge (until this morning) or permission. Hacking of the associated databases does not seem to be involved, since only publicly available information was mined and subsequently falsely represented.

According to Whois, the website in question (which will not be linked here) is registered to the following person:

Registrant Name: LIXIN CHENG
Registrant Organization: Princemountain Transnational Services Inc.
Registrant Street: #300-5900 No. 3 Road
Registrant City: RICHMOND
Registrant State/Province: British Columbia
Registrant Postal Code: V6X 3P7
Registrant Country: CA
Registrant Phone: +1.6043702171

Warning: Do not do business with either AATII or Princemountain Translational Services until this matter is resolved!

Update: As of yesterday afternoon (April 15, 2016, US Pacific), the misused information has been removed from the site.

Update August 2020: According to the Law Society of BC, Li Xin Cheng dba Princemountain Translational Services Inc. has been banned from practicing law by the Supreme Court of British Columbia. Click here for details.

Global Voices: For Artists, the World was a Canvas for Change in 2015

Art is a powerful language that can resonate across countries and cultures, and as such, artists picked up their paintbrushes and pointed their cameras in acts of solidarity, protest and reflection throughout 2015. Global Voices authors took you around the world this year covering these inspiring stories of creativity. As the New Year approaches, let’s take a look back at 16 of them.
Read the whole article on Global Voices…

I have just translated the above article, “For Artists, the World Was a Canvas for Change in 2015,” into German for Global Voices. The translation can be found here.

CAT-Tools “for Dummies”

Cat and toy

I hate to disappoint the animal lovers among my readers, but the term CAT-tool has nothing to do with our furry friends. CAT is the acronym for “computer-assisted translation,” which, in turn, has only marginally to do with machine translation. Computer-assisted translation simply refers to software or apps that help translators with the technical aspects of a translation such that the translator can concentrate on what matters: the translation. By technical aspects I mean tasks such as the following:

  • Looking up terms in a dictionary or in a library of previously translated text, a so-called “translation memory”
  • Ensuring terminological consistency
  • Copying numbers in the correct formats from the source into the target text
  • Various QA checks that involve numbers, formats, punctuation, etc.
  • Applying the same formatting as the source to the target text
  • And many more tasks that can be automated in a simple way

Every CAT-tool on the market that I know of accomplishes the automation of some or all of the aforementioned tasks by chopping up the source text into smaller pieces, so-called segments. A segment can be one sentence, but depending on the language combination, the nature of the text, and a variety of other factors, a segment can be a smaller or larger unit than one sentence. This segmentation is both a blessing and a curse: a blessing, because it enables the software to perform the aforementioned tasks efficiently; and a curse, because the segmentation can lead to a target text that reads more like a never-ending bulleted list of dictionary entries than a fluid text that’s enjoyable to read. Therefore, depending on the type of text to be translated, CAT-tools can be either indispensable or an overcomplication. CAT-tools are indispensable to ensure a consistent terminology for texts such as patents, manuals, textbooks, and any text with repetitive content such as annual reports and/or where a consistent terminology is absolutely required. On the other hand, using a CAT-tool to translate literary works may not be the best approach.

Which CAT-tool do you recommend?

This is the question that other translators have asked me recently quite often, although I am no CAT-tool expert. I just know how to use a few of them and learned most of the functionality by doing. There are so many tools on the market, in various price ranges and with various functionalities, for various operating systems that I cannot really answer this question. In addition, I think the answer depends highly on individual preferences, language combinations, and the type of text.

A good tool should at least have all of the following capabilities:

  • A workflow that fits your specific needs and preferences
  • All required functions for source and target language
  • Ability to handle the source file format
  • Terminology management capabilities
  • Ability to export and import translation memories
  • Ability to perform a spell-check, either tool-intern or extern (I prefer the latter because I run the Duden spell check for German externally, which is more complete than any other spell check I have found)
  • Ability to perform a QA check, either tool-intern or extern

Some people have additional requirements such as the ability to work with voice recognition software etc. The above list is the minimum functionality I expect of a CAT-tool. Of course, another consideration is price, as well as frequency of updates and availability of technical support.

Most tool vendors offer fully functional trial versions. Thus, I would recommend to download these trial versions of various tools and spend half a day or so trying out the various tools on a real text to see which tool works best for you.

Here, I want to again emphasize the issue of segmentation. Some tools segment better than others, and some tools have a better layout than others to help you avoid overly choppy writing. I noticed a marked difference in my style between tools, simply because of the different layouts. Some tools require one editing step more for me after the translation to make the text flow more naturally.

This is definitely something to keep in mind when choosing a tool, because after a while, you will be more or less stuck with that tool. Over the years, I have collected quite a few glossaries and created my own termbases with terms that I researched over many hours in total. These glossaries and termbases are in the format of one specific tool, and exporting and importing these into another tool would require too much effort to make it worthwhile. There is a common format for translation memories (TMX) that makes them easy to transfer from one tool to another. Unfortunately, the same is not (yet?) true for translation projects and termbases, which every tool saves in its own proprietary format. Sometimes termbases can be exported as well — however, more often than not this is only possible for the source and target term pairs, but not for annotations and categorizations of the terms. That is, the expertise that went into the creation of the termbases cannot be transferred, which is what makes these termbases so valuable in the first place.

Therefore: Choose wisely, grasshopper!