myGengo fills a niche and "does what it says on the tin".
by Grey • January 17, 2010 • Uncategorized • 18 Comments
I’ve recently been trying out the translation service myGengo as a translator and thought I’d share some of my experience and impressions.
I started by creating an account and taking my first shot at the test to qualify for jobs at the “standard” level, which pays the translator a whopping $0.03 per word. Much to my surprise, I was actually rejected after this first attempt. OK, I had to translate a brief (about 300 words) weather report, which isn’t my area of specialization, but I still find it hard to believe that my translation didn’t sound “natural” in “several” places, as the reviewer claimed. Anyway, whether it did or not, this initial rejection actually, on the whole, reflects well on the service since it means that they have a screening system that should keep out most of the “hacks”. I do think there may be room for improvement in the process, but I’m sure it’s better to err on the side of caution.
In any event, myGengo allows you to try again three days after a rejection, so I did. I got a different text the second time around and passed without any problem. I then went on to pass the tests for pro-level texts and for proofreading on my first try. And by the way, I wrote to myGengo after my initial rejection to share some of my thoughts on the process, and they did get back to me quickly with some explanation of their views on testing. So there are real people behind the service who appear to be knowledgeable and helpful.
On the Saturday morning after passing the pro-level test, the first two jobs showed up in my queue. As it happens, I was home and not doing anything in particular, so I thought I’d go ahead and take the jobs on. They were two different texts, each about 220 words in length and neither particularly difficult. One was a pro-level job, and the other an “ultra” job (which includes a pass with a proofreader in addition to the translator). Once I started a job, I was given a time limit of one hour to complete it (I don’t know if this time limit varies with text length), which was plenty of time given that I completed each in about half that time. Both jobs were then approved by the customer. It should be noted here that the customer has the right to reject a job and receive a full refund, in which case the translator is not paid for their work either. I don’t know how that process might work, though, and if there’s a verification or dispute procedure or what.
My “reward” (their terminology) for these jobs totaled about $35, which is paid via PayPal usually within 24 hours of requesting a “payout”. I just requested my payout today, so I don’t know exactly how it’s going to work, but there’s apparently a 3% charge applied by PayPal(*), which is another thing to keep in mind when thinking about the rates myGengo pays. On the other hand, payment by myGengo is essentially immediate, which is a lot better than the 30, 60 or even 90 day payment terms most clients apply.
Also, one of the customers for these jobs that I did requested specific experience in the field, but the myGengo staff was quick to point out to the customer that myGengo doesn’t assign jobs by area of specialization and that the customer could withdraw the job if that was an absolute necessity for them. I was also contacted by a real person, who pointed out the customer’s request and explained myGengo’s position on specialist jobs, saying that I was free to take the job on if I felt I could do a good job. So again, there are knowledgeable people behind the service who are there to help you out when you need it.
So… the rates. Yes, they’re low. The “standard” rate is especially low. At current exchange rates, it’s even less than what agencies pay me for proofreading. Actually, it’s less than what myGengo themselves pay for proofreading! But it’s important to keep in mind that myGengo is designed for short, simple (i.e. non-specialist) texts, and they are very clear as to what the customer should expect at each of their three service levels. And also, as a translator, you’re perfectly free to do or ignore translations whenever you want. So if you’ve got nothing better to do and there’s a short text you can bang out in a few minutes “for fun” (my words, not myGengo’s as far as I know), why not get paid a few bucks at the same time?
Is myGengo a threat? Will it drag rates down in the translation market as a whole? I suppose time will tell, but the way the people at myGengo are currently positioning and presenting their service, I don’t think so. In one of their e-mails to me, they said that myGengo is targeting people who want short texts translated quickly — the kinds of things some today are trying to use Google Translate for (“emails, blog posts, tweets, articles, anything non-specialist” were their exact words to me). Somewhere else (in the comments to a blog post, I think) I read someone from myGengo who wrote that these are the kinds of texts most professional translators hate to take on. And I think that’s pretty much true. But why do we hate these short texts? For me, it’s not so much for the length of the text, but for all the time you waste with the client before (and after) the job and the fact that most of the time you have to interrupt other work to do them. With myGengo, though, you don’t have that problem. You do the jobs only when you want, and you don’t have to be bothered by phone calls and e-mails from the customer to figure out if and when you can take them on.
I did my first two jobs, for example, in half-hour chucks of time in which I wasn’t doing anything else, and at the end of the day I got paid about €23-24 for an hour of work. Not a huge amount, but not all that bad either, considering that the alternative for that hour of my time was €0. In fact, another thing they’ve told me is that they aren’t looking for professional translators to work full time for them, but rather for translators willing to do the odd translation now and then in our “spare time [to] earn a little extra money”. (By the way, they also have an “affiliate” program that pays you 10% commission on referrals, so that may be something you’ll want to figure into the equation, as well.)
So all in all, given the way myGengo is currently designed and is being marketed (their slogan is “Simple human translation”), I don’t see the service as a threat, and I will probably do translations for them in the future.
Finally, I was asked by a Twitter follower whether you work online when working with myGengo. So to answer that question, no, not really. Not in the sense of having a web-based CAT tool to use. Job management is all online, but for the actual translation phase, you’re given the entire source text in one field along side an empty field into which you enter the translation. So you could type the translation directly into this web form if you wanted (and for very short texts I imagine I would), but I copied the source text into Word and translated it there using Wordfast. Then I copied the translated text back into the field for the translation on the web page. But I see that Wordfast is working on their web-based Wordfast Anywhere, and I think it would be interesting to see something like that implemented by myGengo in the future.
But there are some questions I still have about the service that I’ll want to look into, such as:
- How does the job queue work exactly? Do multiple translators see the same jobs at the same time?
- What happens when a customer rejects a job? Does myGengo make sure the complaint is valid?
- What happens if an “ultra” job is rejected because of a mistake the proofreader makes? Does the translator lose the credits, too, even though it wasn’t their fault? (This may not be all that likely, but I suppose you never know….)
And if and when I find the answers to these questions, I’ll let you all know.
~G
ANSWERS: I’ve just received an e-mail from the myGengo people in response to this blog post, so here are the answers to those questions:
- The job queue is on a first-come-first-served basis, and the reason my jobs were in the queue for so long is likely because Italian<>English has only been available on the site for a couple of weeks. Also, e-mail reminders are sent out every hour when there are jobs in the queue, and there is an RSS feed you can follow.
- Yes, myGengo has a low (about 1%) rejection rate and so is able to manually review rejections to make sure they are valid. And in their experience, they generally are. Not a lot of cheating the system apparently.
- For the ultra jobs, the default is to not pay either the translator or the proofreader in the event of a rejection by the customer, but here, too, they are willing and available to manually review such cases in order to determine fault and make adjustments, and they do keep a record of the text at both the pre- and post-proofing stages.
They also mentioned that they may eventually add some CAT functionality to the site in the future, but their intention for now is to keep things simple, rather than “reinventing the wheel”.
—
(*) UPDATE: I’ve received my payout in my PayPal account, and the fees were actually closer to 5% because, as I’ve now seen on PayPal, the actual rate is 3.4% (for transactions up to €2,500.00) plus €0.35 per transaction, so next time I’ll wait to have a larger balance before paying out. Anyway, that means that I actually received just under €23 for the two jobs, rather than between €23 and €24. Not a huge difference, but still something to keep in mind.
Thanks for the interesting feedback, Drane, and for answering my question on Twitter.
I guess one of your main concerns was whether real people are behind this or not and you got your answer.
I’m genuinely surprised they considered a weather report to be suitable for a “standard level” test, though, you yourself said you don’t specialize in those. Weather reports are no simple texts.
Naturally (for them), the sample of 300 words was an unpaid one. Since their service is designed for short texts, how can one be sure that their unpaid sample hasn’t actually been submitted for translation by some client?
Also, I find the “work on your spare time” bait at least lame on their part. It’s my spare time! If I wanted to work I would do normal, well paid work. You yourself had to work on a weekend with no extra payment for that. More and more, agencies and direct clients expect us to work during Saturdays and Sundays as if they were any other day and we do little to show them it’s not going happen without extra payment.
Having to work under such a strict time limit is another pretty negative thing for me. Yes, we all have deadlines and you say time was enough for the texts you worked on but simple and short text or not, one should be allowed some time to be able to work in peace. I’m not at all sure I would want to constantly work under such stressful conditions. I need to clear my mind, have a cup of tea, stretch my body a little between projects. In my eyes, at MyGengo they think of translators (professional or not) more like machines and less like actual persons.
All in all, they may not constitute a direct threat to professional linguists, but for the rates they’re paying and for the working conditions they’re providing, I’d say their service is tantamount to absolute professional degradation.
Hi Katerina,
Thanks for your comments.
Well, the “real person” thing wasn’t one of my main concerns really, but it was nice to find out that they do seem to have a feel for the translation industry and are there helping and being clear about their intentions. The interaction with real people also helped to keep me from worrying about the potential for the test/real-job scam, which did actually cross my mind. All in all, the people behind myGengo seem open, honest and knowledgeable.
About the time limit, I should point out that the clock starts running from the time you click the “Start job” button, but before that you still get to see the whole text and could start working on it before you press this button. The risk, I suppose, is that you do some of the work and then find that the job has been taken by somebody else, but the two jobs I did were actually in the queue several hours before I accepted them, so it would have been doable in my case. And really, an hour for 200 words of simple translation should really always be enough time, since you decide when the clock starts ticking. But if you think there’s a chance you won’t make it or it’ll be too stressful, just don’t take on the job. And in any case, take a tea break before you start!
You’re absolutely right, of course, that our spare time is “ours”, not theirs. And if you have spare time that you don’t feel like using for translating, then just don’t check your myGengo job queue. But if you’ve got a bit of time and feel like you could fill it with a brief translation without adding any stress to your day, then why not?
If it doesn’t cause stress and may even relieve some boredom by filling time in which you have nothing better to do, plus you get paid for it, I don’t really see anything wrong with it. Because you are totally free to decide when and if you do a job for them, to me the working conditions (rates aside) are better than for most other clients. And the pro rates are lower than what my agency clients pay me, but they aren’t nearly as low as what some “traditional” translation agencies try to offer.
And at least myGengo is very transparent with their users as to what they should expect to get for their money. I know many agencies that don’t use proofreaders and yet try and pass their work off as “high quality”. With myGengo, you know when you’re getting a proofreader and when you’re not.
So I don’t at all feel that myGengo is treating us like machines. As I said in my blog, they don’t expect, or even really want, full-time translators at these rates. They want people who enjoy translating and have a bit of spare time now and then to do it for them when they feel like it.
Cheers,
~Grey
Thanks for taking the time to answer, Grey, and apologies for calling you by your last name!
Hehe. No problem. It happens all the time!
Hello Grey, thanks a lot for this informative post. Most interesting. I’ll be listening out for future developments.
@spokk
Hi Grey, have you continued to work for them? Much work passed your way at the higher rates?
Sarah
Hi Sarah,
No, as far as I know, there hadn’t been any other jobs to do until today, when a 500-word “standard” job showed up in my queue. It was a company profile (or something similar) and not something I think should have been submitted at the standard level, so I personally wouldn’t have done it, but I see that someone did grab it fairly quickly this time.
Just FYI, it was a little more than 500 words, and the time limit was 3 hours for the job.
Anyway, it was a little disappointing to see a job like that at the standard rate, but at least the site tries to be clear as to what th customer should expect at that level.
Ciao!
Grey
Hi,
I just logged in, took a test, and though I do suspect it won’t take a long time before all jobs are submitted at standard level, was wondering if you could be so kind as to answer me a couple of questions.
I’m starting out and can manage En-Es and Es-En. Is it MyGengo policy to only allow you one pair, as in only one native language?
And I don’t know if you’d happen to know why the test ES-En doesn’t seem to be available, at least at the Standard level. As you’re already inside, maybe there’s been talk about it being saturated, maybe they’ve closed down that pair for good? I don’t want to send them a mail and be a pain, lol,
nice blog, btw
Hi,
I’m not sure about the one native language thing. Since I’m not bilingual (i.e. dual mother tongue) myself, I haven’t looked into it. I would have thought it was possible, though. But maybe they want to prevent people from translating into their foreign language, so they block out bilinguals, too, erring on the side of caution? Don’t know.
As for the ES-en test, it’s likely that they already have all the translators they need for that pair at the moment, based on current job quantities. I know that when I took my tests, there were certain pairs that weren’t available for that reason. I don’t think that means it’s closed for good, but it may be closed until job volumes increase.
HTH
Cheers,
~G
Hi juanluis,
As long as translators can pass our tests, they can have access to any language pair. Note that we do regular spot-checks so anyone who passes with the help of a friend will need to have their friend with them for every job if they want to maintain their status
Some language pairs do become saturated but we rarely close tests as we want to welcome all translators. In the case of ES EN tests, we had an inordinate number of applicants due to being featured on Colombian national TV so we had to close them for a while. They are now open, so please apply!
Best Regards,
Matt
myGengo – Co-Founder, CTO
Hi Matt,
is there any chance that IT EN tests will be reopen too?
Thanks.
Elena
Sorry,
what I meant was EN IT tests.
I failed my first test because I quote the expression “gatas paridas” is unintelligible in Spanish from Spain. Maybe the translator who wrote this has several Masters degrees but if you ask your average 5 year old in Spain she will gladly enlighten you. The article was very colloquial so my translation reflected this. Subsequent “fails” included comments like “estas” should be “éstas” -when in fact the Royal Academy changed this rule in 1995 (!) something that passed this genius translator by. I have tried to take the test again just because I´m so stubborn but the Web Site seems to bring me back in a loop. Very disappointing.
Yeah, I failed the test the first time, too, which I thought was curious for the “standard” level. But I tried again (stubborn like you
) and passed without any problem. I then passed the test for the “Pro” level on the first try. So it may be that they need to be a bit more careful about who they have grade the translator tests. But at least stories like this make it clear that they aren’t letting just anyone do translation work for them.
I failed the “pro” level three times for “awkward-sounding” translations, which kind of ticked me off because that means I was dismissed on a very subjunctive, style-related issue, not to mention the pro rates are still less than half my standard rate (Which is not high, mind you). In the very least, MG tries to regulate quality and I commend that, but I’ve chosen to focus on securing regular paying work than wasting my time on 2 cent jobs.
And that’s my 2 cents.
Well, yes, you should definitely focus on higher paying jobs. myGengo is designed for translators looking for a quickie job to do in their free time when they would otherwise not be making any money. But unfortunately, the difference between a “standard” translator and a “pro” is fairly subjective and largely style-related. Not sure there’s really any way around that.
Hi Grey,
I also passed the EN-SP standard level and am still waiting for the pro test results. However, I am rather disappointed about the work flow. I have only received ONE job offer from myGengo in 2 weeks, and it was no longer available when I went to check it. I don´t think this is really working. Have you received more work from them?
Cheers
No, the job volume isn’t any better for IT>EN, and there’s the same problem of jobs being snatched up fast. I thought it was just because my language pair wasn’t very popular, but I wouldn’t have thought that was the case for your language pair. Maybe they’re still mostly just a popular service in Japan?