Incorrect behavior on translation pages

[Billy Idle]

What should I do to report a user who behaves incorrectly by minimally varying the translations of others (often for the worse), just to get more gift points (and therefore lengthening the viewing times on the pages)?
Thanks

[Chauff]

Hi, you can go to player's page, click "report this player", click 'See more" (at the bottom) and use the button about corrupting translations.

[Billy Idle]

Thank you.
This is a person who, instead of wanting to contribute to increasingly effective translations, seems to only care about obtaining more gifts at the expense of the translations of others, which are often more efficient.
Billy Idle

[BaconPotatoSalad]

Dear Concerned.

I suggest writing on paper players name ... tape it to your wall behind your comp or on your comp for quick reference. ( cliff notes)

[Billy Idle]

Thanks, but I remember his name well because he is too unfair to everyone!

[Aelfix]

Hello everyone,
Dear Billy Idle is referring to me, so I would like to make it clear: I am not looking for gift points, I don't care about them.
I am a translator, I love translation and this site; I wanted to dedicate my free time to BGA to make the best translations I could: never randomly, always researching games before I translated.
I mean no harm and I am truly sorry that my fellow user Billy Idle got me so wrong that he unfairly reported me. I will try to avoid overcorrection from now on, but I can assure you, my changes are always meant to improve the final output for Italian users.

[KongKing123]

As a neutral, non-Italian speaking person: it seems you both want what's best for the site and the effort you put in is commendable, but unfortunately you got into a bit of a feud because of it. I don't want to sound holier-than-thou here, but there's really no reason for a straightforward phrase like "Thus, you cannot report these players for this single reason." to cause a battle like this (I assume this isn't the only example):


I have done a fair amount of translation on BGA myself, so I have been on both ends of the "minor changes" situation. It's not fun when it happens to you because of the input/reward ratio (even when there are no gift points involved), but I don't take it personally and often agree that the new translation is better, or that I overlooked something. When I disagree, I look it up when in doubt and either learn something new or revert to the previous translation with a comment that proves me right. I only get frustrated if the "correction" is clearly wrong and/or obviously done to still keep credit for the translation. But ultimately, what matters is the quality of the translations, not personal credit.

Have you both read the BGA translation guidelines? There is always a bit of a grey area, but I think in most cases (in Dutch anyway) a fitting translation can be found that follows the original English text as much as possible, which is objectively the "best" translation. This applies even if the original text itself is not perfect; so I will, for example, translate "Sorry" literally and not as "Our apologies", even when I think that the latter would fit the context better. If the original text is badly phrased, unclear or incorrect, you should submit an English to English change request instead of trying to compensate in the translation. And at some point, it's just good enough for everyone to understand and not worth trying to improve further. You can't turn "Thus, you cannot report these players for this single reason." into a literary masterpiece.

Concerning game translations, I find it's a good idea to try and look up an officially translated rulebook for game-specific terminology (for example on BoardGameGeek) and reference it in the comments, so there can be no discussion about that. If it's not easily accessible, I usually share it through PDF Host.

Anyway, these are just some remarks I had to potentially defuse the situation. Perhaps you could try and talk it out privately instead of through translation comments and reports.

[Billy Idle]

Aelfix's words are different from what appears in his translations (and comments)! However, I accept your comments.
As you say, KongKing123, we should try to translate as best we can (and this is why I translate and not as a gift) in order to help everyone play and understand the texts at their best. As you can see from the various translations in which I "meet" Aelfix, if he improves on my erroneous translations, I don't insist on changing the translation, but I accept it: he has improved the translation!
I get irritated when I see the opposite and that is when my translation is better (Italian is a difficult language even for Italians and literally sticking to translations from English to Italian is not good for readers and translation).
I happen, surfing or playing, to see old translations that do not correspond to the correct meaning and I retranslate the text (I am not interested in gifts)!
What we need to do is just improve the translations by helping each other.
If I can make an observation, it would be nice to be able to leave a comment alongside the translation of another. For example, I happened to see an improvement on one of my translations and I couldn't thank (if not through my notes) the new improvement.
Thank you all for your patience.
Billy