The United State’s oldest dictionary publisher is making room for crypto.
Of the new terms added, “altcoin” and “metaverse” are perhaps the most relevant additions for crypto enthusiasts.
The publisher defined “altcoin” as any of the now roughly20,000 cryptocurrenciesin circulation “that are regarded as alternatives to established cryptocurrencies and especially to Bitcoin.”
This definition may come as a disappointment to Ethereans, who havearguedfor years that Ethereum—alongside Bitcoin—is no longer an altcoin. The second-largest cryptocurrency by market cap also leads the crypto community in developer activity, fee volume, decentralized finance, and other metrics.
According to the company’slistof September additions, the “metaverse” is “a persistent virtual environment that allows access to and interoperability of multiple individual virtual realities.”
This is as opposed to “meatspace,” officially defined as “the physical world and environment, especially as contrasted with the virtual world of cyberspace.”
The dictionary’s stamp of approval may also bring clarity to a once foggy phrase for the general public.
Mark Zuckerberg—whorebrandedhis company around the concept last year—has previouslydefinedthe metaverse as “an embodied internet where you’re in the experience, not just looking at it.”
Crypto-related technologies like non-fungible tokens (NFTs), which earned Collins Dictionary’sWord of the Yearaward in 2021, play a big role in the metaverse. They help provide a neutral layer for owning digital assets that are transferable between different virtual worlds.
Current examples include metaverse games likeThe Sandbox, which lets users buy and sell virtual assets in the form of a game.
Merriam-Webster takes a page from crypto Twitter
Webster’s list included hundreds of other financial terms that you’re likely to see on crypto Twitter.
Words such as “unbanked” and “underbanked” refer to individuals with no or limited access to banking services.
Meanwhile, “shrinkflation” is the reduction of a product’s volume per unit despite being offered at the same price. This is related to “inflation,” which has been central in directing central banking activity, global markets, and by extension, crypto markets.
Finally, “use case” refers to “a use to which something can be put,” something crypto’sharshest criticsclaim the asset class fundamentally lacks.
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Welcome to L.A. TACO’s daily news briefs, where we bring our loyal members, readers, and supporters the latest headlines about Los Angeles politics and culture. Stay informed and look closely.
—Tropical Storm Kay could potentially drop a “year’s worth of rain” on drought-stricken Southern California today, raising fears of dangerous flooding. [CNN]
—Merriam-Webster has added the word “birria” to its dictionaries with the definition: “a Mexican dish of stewed meat seasoned especially with ‘chili’ peppers. [MW].”
—All northbound lanes of the 5 Freeway will be shut down at night in the next week to make repairs from the Route Fire. [ABC]
—Two people are dead after a plane crash yesterday at the Santa Monica Airport. [CBS]
—The term “squaw” will be scrubbed from 80 geographic features across California. [KTLA]
—15 “tiny houses” housing homeless veterans were destroyed by a fire at the Veterans Administration’s West Los Angeles Campus this morning. [KTLA]
—The L.A. Rams lost their first game of the NFL season, against the Buffalo Bills. [BBC]
—7 of the best art projects “and oddities” from this year’s Burning Man. [Art Majeur]
—An argument in Downtown escalated into the fatal shooting of one man in his thirties last night. [ABC]
—Low income communities in Los Angeles are feeling the worst effects of the ongoing heat wave. [MSNBC]
—The trial of an FBI agent accused of selling classified information to the Armenian Mafia for cash, vacations, a motorcycle, and the services of a sex worker will begin next week in L.A. [LA Mag]
—Human trafficking victims from China were discovered at a cannabis farm in the Mojave Desert, where they were working without pay, growing and trimming herb for dispensaries. [NBC]
—Chipotle is hitting back at a thieving burrito scheme made viral on TikTok by removing the option order a taco online. [Yahoo!]
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Merriam-Webster has added 370 new words and definitions to its dictionary, and for better or worse, they reflect our current times, with now-everyday terms related to the pandemic, uneasy economic times and rapidly evolving technology.
While some newly recognized words are hardly new — popular chat abbreviations like “FWIW” and “ICYMI” — “for what it’s worth” and “in case you missed it,” respectively — others are particularly timely. (“a virtual persistent environment”), (“the practice of reducing a product’s amount or volume...
Merriam-Webster has added 370 new words and definitions to its dictionary, and for better or worse, they reflect our current times, with now-everyday terms related to the pandemic, uneasy economic times and rapidly evolving technology.
While some newly recognized words are hardly new — popular chat abbreviations like “FWIW” and “ICYMI” — “for what it’s worth” and “in case you missed it,” respectively — others are particularly timely. “Metaverse” (“a virtual persistent environment”), “shrinkflation” (“the practice of reducing a product’s amount or volume per unit while continuing to offer it at the same price”) and “subvariant” (“one of two or more distinctive forms or types of the same variant”), for example, have become fairly commonplace in MarketWatch lingo.
“Some of these words will amuse or inspire, others may provoke debate. Our job is to capture the language as it is used,” Peter Sokolowski, editor at large for Merriam-Webster, said in a statement Wednesday. “Words offer a window into our ever-changing language and culture, and are only added to the dictionary when there is clear and sustained evidence of use.”
The dictionary company updates its words about once a year, the last time being October 2021.
Here are several more new additions that should be familiar by now to MarketWatch readers:
Altcoin: Any of various cryptocurrencies that are regarded as alternatives to established cryptocurrencies, and especially to bitcoin.
Emergency use authorization: An authorization granted by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration during a public health emergency that allows for the use of a drug or other medical product prior to its full approval.
Greenwash: To make something, such as a product, policy, or practice appear to be more environmentally friendly or less environmentally damaging than it really is.
Microgrid: A small grid, especially a local electrical grid that can be connected to a larger network but that is also capable of operating independently.
Side hustle: Work performed for income supplementary to one’s primary job.
There was also a selection of delicious, food-specific new additions, such as “pumpkin spice,” “ras el hanout,” “omakase,” “mojo,” “birria” and “banh mi.”
And here are some that — to the best of our knowledge — have not yet appeared in MarketWatch copy. (Challenge accepted!)
Yeet: Used to express surprise, approval or excited enthusiasm.
Sus: Suspicious or suspect.
Janky: Of very poor quality.
Adorkable: Socially awkward or quirky in a way that is endearing.
Hoglet: A baby hedgehog.
For more of the new additions, check out Merriam-Webster’s blog post.
Not long after the news broke that former Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo had been assassinated, posts and videos of Chinese celebrating the killing began circulating on English-language social media.
This wasn’t an accident or viral happenstance, but part of an organized campaign spearheaded by a group calling itself The Great Translation Movement. Formed after the outbreak of hostilities between Russia and Ukraine earlier this year, the GTM first drew widespread attention for translating misogynistic, callous, or otherwise inflammatory posts by users on Weibo and other Chinese social media sites and reposting them to Twitter — most famously a repeated joke about Chinese men being willing to offer shelter to Ukrainian women. In the months since, the GTM has repeatedly translated and reposted similar comments from Chinese social media onto international platforms, with an especial focus on hot-button issues like the Shanghai lockdown or the above-mentioned assassination of Abe.
It should be noted that although the comments the GTM translates are not necessarily representative of Chinese public opinion, they are generally authentic. Recent years have seen a rise in extremist and hate speech in online spaces all over the world. Driven by irrational passions — and egged on by algorithms that reward engagement and hot takes at the expense of measured reasoning and factual statements — social media users increasingly view the world in black and white. Enemies lurk around every corner, and the internet has become a force multiplier for conspiracy theories and misinformation.
Crucially, however, while the GTM positions itself as a kind of hall monitor for online speech, it has far more in common with the hateful trends it claims to abhor.
The Great Translation Movement has its origins in a number of Chinese and China-focused forums on Reddit. One of the most prominent, r/chonglangTV, was known for promoting and using slurs and hate speech such as “Cheena,” a derivation of the term for China used by Imperial Japan. In March, the subreddit was shut down due to a violation of Reddit’s rules “against posting personal information.”
The GTM reflects these preoccupations. In an interview with German media outlet Deutsche Welle, an anonymous member of the group behind the GTM social media account called Chinese “a collection of the proud, arrogant, populist, cruel, bloodthirsty, and those lacking in sympathy.” They added that the group “hopes people of Chinese descent from all over the world can rid themselves of these negative emotions, truly integrate with civilized society, and feel ashamed of their ignorance.”
Some may be willing to overlook the frankly racist motivations of these groups, but they do so at their own peril
- Tang Jingtai, professor
Unsurprisingly, the group’s real focus seems to be less about helping the targets of hate speech on the Chinese internet, such as Ukrainian women or Abe’s grieving family, than fanning the flames of that hate and redirecting it back at China and Chinese around the world. Again, Ukraine offers a useful example: After the group translated and shared jokes from Chinese social media about “taking in” Ukrainian women, it caused a wave of anti-China sentiment within Ukraine itself. Those most affected by the backlash weren’t the largely anonymous posters singled out by the GTM, but Chinese who had lived in Ukraine for years, and who now found themselves in the crosshairs.
The GTM is hardly alone in facilitating the spread of hate online. Still, it is a shame to see translation used as a tool to divide, rather than unite. The Russian poet Alexander Pushkin famously called translators “the post-horses of civilization.” In Europe, translated works fueled the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. In Asia, they played a key role in the spread of scientific advances and Western learning. Many of these works emphasized the supposedly deep contrasts between Chinese and Western civilization, but their translators helped bridge these divides, facilitating dialogue and communication across civilizations.
That’s not what’s happening here. Context is vital. The GTM — and other, similar movements, regardless of nationality — have taken advantage of people’s trust in translators and translation to sow hatred and exacerbate tensions. Some may be willing to overlook the frankly racist motivations of these groups, but they do so at their own peril. The real enemy isn’t this country or that one, but poverty and ignorance, barbarism and hate.
Translator: Matt Turner; editor: Wu Haiyun; portrait artist: Wang Zhenhao.
(Header image: Alexsl/Getty Creative/VCG, reedited by Sixth Tone)
On June 19, 2019, at 12 on the dot, I’m waiting on the jetty outside Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum as I see the familiar figure of author Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer, large and well-dressed, emerge from under the arches and cross the road, accompanied by a group of publishers holding umbrellas.
Pfeijffer’s Dutch publishing house, De Arbeiderspers, had decided to celebrate the rights sales for his book Grand Hotel Europa with a summit. They invited not just the foreign editors, but also the translators who they had hired, for a discussion on the future of Europe, a contract signing session, and a boat trip around the canals.
When I translated Pfeijffer’s debut novel, Rupert, in 2007, I was just starting out as a translator and had no idea what I was getting myself into. Thank God the book was short; it took me a year to understand the Dutch, figure out the playful literary style, and render it into some kind of appropriate English.
errified of getting it wrong, I traveled to Genoa, Pfeijffer’s adoptive city, to ask him a thousand fussy little questions about the book. This trip turned out to be a great help when translating his next novel, La Superba, which is set there. I was able to refer to the photos I’d taken and remember the walking tour Ilja had given me of the city, which also features in the novel—with a character who says some of the things I said at the time. It was a bizarre, entertaining experience, translating my own words back into English.
There was something deeply comforting to know I wasn’t the only translator working on the text, to sense the industry of a multitude of us beetling away in unison and to be able to ask for help.
Cut to a decade later, and I was facing 18 months of translating the bestselling Grand Hotel Europa, a compelling novel of ideas set partly in the fading glory of a central European grand hotel. I had a massive 130,000 words before me, written in an array of registers. Given the book’s popularity in the Netherlands, if I mentioned to anyone here that I was about to translate it, I was met with impressed nods and comments like, “Wow, you must be good if they’ve commissioned you to do that.” No pressure!
I pictured myself slogging away on my own, a lonely pilgrim wandering around Venice in Google Street View. I would reread The Magic Mountain, watch The Grand Budapest Hotel, and tumble down the usual research-related rabbit holes us translators find. But instead, on that fateful day in June, I met three of the other translators: Leonor, Gonzalo, and Lutz, working into Portuguese, Spanish, and Croatian, respectively. As we drank the free champagne and watched our publishers sign contracts and pose for photos, we decided we would meet regularly and discuss the translation challenges we encountered along the way.
However, just after we’d had our first get-together—now joined by the French translator Françoise, German translator Ira, and Macedonian translator Zoran, all of whom I’d managed to locate—Covid struck. We found ourselves confined to our homes. But by now, we were corresponding regularly by email. Hedda, the Norwegian translator, joined the expanding group and swiftly set up a group page and email address to make correspondence even easier. There was something deeply comforting to know I wasn’t the only translator working on the text, to sense the industry of a multitude of us beetling away in unison and to be able to ask for help.
We also shared visual aids. For example, Françoise found an image of a coat of arms mentioned in the book, which was helpful because none of us knew much about heraldic terminology. Leonor found a picture of the family chapel within the Santa Maria di Nazareth church, Lutz picked up on various typos, we debated the correct spelling of the Greek word eútektos/eútuktos, we shared information on the order of the Maltese knights. Françoise pointed out a hidden Macbeth quote on page 19, Zoran explained Macedonian history.
We talked about the places where the Caravaggio plotline verged from historical fact into fiction, and the surprising things we thought were fiction that turned out to be fact. One thing many of us struggled with were the sex scenes, imbued with Dutch humor—should they be adapted to our cultural norms or not? Were they sexist or not? Irina told me, “The biggest challenge, as far as I am concerned, was to translate the sex scenes. Maybe I’m wrong, but I found it to be a mixture of poetry and pornography and I had to choose the words very carefully to achieve the same effect.”
As the weeks went by, we welcomed new members: Tibor, Ryszard, Sanna, Maria, and more, all while compiling a list of questions to the author so that he could efficiently answer our queries in one fell swoop. There are currently 18 translators in the group and most of us have finished our translations, though some joined as part of a second wave.
One thing many of us struggled with were the sex scenes, imbued with Dutch humor—should they be adapted to our cultural norms or not?
Irina, the Romanian translator wrote to me, “Unfortunately, it wasn’t really a collaboration for me because I could only start working when many of you had already finished the translation, but I found it very useful to read your comments. An example was the sentence on page 84 which compares a place in size to Dutch municipality Barneveld. Thanks to the fact that you had already been in contact with Ilja, I knew his preference (to find an equivalent-sized place in our own country so that the reader understood the idea). I also found his reactions and your discussion very helpful with regard to other translation difficulties.”
The group of translators continues to share good news. The German edition, which was the first to come out, was widely reviewed; it was on the Spiegel bestseller list for three weeks and is in its fifth printing. The Portuguese edition has been well received and reprinted, the Norwegian edition had rave reviews and is selling well, and the US edition was reviewed in The New York Times. Radka wrote to me, “Such cooperation creates a bond. I would love to have such a forum at hand for every book I translate :-))”
In the meantime, a new subset has arisen: those of us who have gone on to translate Marieke Lucas Rijneveld’s second novel. Hedda wrote, “I especially enjoyed being in touch with colleagues who, like me, are very deep into the text and have questions and comments about things that the majority of readers might not think about. Reading to translate is completely different from just reading, and often a lonely experience. Now I could join in the discussions about translation problems in different languages, witness various interpretations of passages and exchange thoughts on all sorts of things myself. I enjoyed it! And it was very useful too, especially because sometimes someone pointed out something that I had overlooked myself. I’m sure my translation improved as a result.”
From the Grand Hotel Europa Summit (c) Singel publishing house.
A tradition has been born.
__________________________
Grand Hotel Europa has been translated by the following translators (and more):Ira Wilhelm (German), Radovan ‘Lutz’ Lučić (Croatian), Maria Leonor Raven (Portuguese), Sanna van Leeuwen (Finnish), Radka Smejkalova (Czech), Gonzalo Fernández Gómez (Spanish), Irina Anton (Romanian), Jolita Urnikytė (Lithuanian), Maria Encheva (Bulgarian), Françoise Antoine (French), Hedda Vormeland (Norwegian), Michele Hutchison (English), Ekaterina Assoian, Irina Michajlova, Irina Leichenko (Russian), Inbal Silberstein (Hebrew), Tibor Bérczes, Miklós Fenyves (Hungarian), Claudia Cozzi (Italian), Zoran Radicheski (Macedonian), Mila Vojinović (Serbian), and Erhan Gürer (Turkish).
There are many terms from classic and modern SF that remain unresearched, and theHistorical Dictionary of Science Fictionwill be continually updated, especially as additional resources are put online. Boing Boing is syndicating new entries from the HDSF on a regular basis. (Read the series introduction.)
The science-fictional history of the word supervillain is hard to trace primarily because it's hard to agree on just what one is. A superhero is not just a really terrific hero—or, rather, it originally was; piles of news articles in the 1910s and 1920s apply the word to the brave feats of military men. But in the comics sense, a superhero generally has superpowers, powers beyond what is possible for ordinary people. Unless you are, say, Batman, in which case aren't you just a rich guy in a costume with fancy toys? No, the toys are also beyond what is ordinarily possible: they use superscience. There are still nuances, of course, and one can reasonably debate whether a costumed do-gooder with no special abilities or gadgets deserves the name, but for our purposes, we will stipulate that, say, pre-surgery Kick-Ass wasn't a superhero, just a kid in a suit.
While there are many tropes associated with supervillains (genius-level intelligence, vast wealth, dreams of global conquest, costumes, longhaired cats), we will make their defining characteristics the same as those of superheroes—superhuman powers or magical science—but used for ill rather than good.
Like superhero, the word supervillain is found in generic senses at an early date; the Oxford English Dictionary has evidence from 1912 in the sense 'an extremely villainous person', and from then on there is no shortage of examples referring to dastardly deeds. But unlike superhero, which doesn't clearly show up in the comics sense until the 1930s, there are several early quotations for supervillain which would seem to represent our modern sense. A 1917 newspaper review of a play describes a scientist as "the supervillain who does the plotting," with said plotting consisting in part of developing a bioweapon from a leprosy germ that would instantaneously incapacitate a victim; we're not a doctor, but that seems sufficiently unlike how leprosy works to count as "superscience." A 1920 example uses the word in reference to Dr. Fu Manchu, the stereotypical evil genius mad scientist. And a 1933 story features a Professor Sheldon who has a secret hideaway in an undersea grotto that he can flood as a defensive tactic; although lacking a longhaired cat, this also strikes the reader as pretty darn supervillainous. By this time, the comics sense catches up to us, and we are unquestionably in supervillain territory.
Translation ROI: How Do We Gauge the Value of a Good Translation?
In our past Insights articles, we expounded upon the value of good translation and how content that is not only well-translated but can inspire CTA engagement in your marketing and outreach efforts.
Indeed, it goes without saying that a customer is more likely to click on “Buy Now” or “Read More” when they can actually understand what these words mean in their own native languages on your websites and other marketing platforms.
However, if you’re a business owner, you might be asking, what is the actual ROI of engaging in transcreation?
Because every single decision you make has to factor in cost; every investment you make, even when expanding your reach to marketing your business to further shores, comes with the expectation of increasing revenue as the end result.
In working out the best decisions for the company, you need to think about how your decisions affect everyone for the better and how every investment would pay off, even before your next marketing dollar is spent. And that includes budgeting for content transcreation.
Measuring the ROI for investing in translations might prove slightly trickier than other conventional costs, as the metrics may not be as easily available. This is all the more confounding in the hospitality and travel business.
What kind of formulas are there to help gauge how much more bang you are getting for every buck you invest in getting your website translated into Korean, or your menus into Japanese?
This is where you need to put on your creativity hat and think out of the box – and Insights is here to help you with just that.
REVENUE PER AVAILABLE ROOM (RevPAR)
Tried and tested, this would be the most obvious way to begin. The RevPAR is helpful when assessing if there has been any increase in a hotel’s ability to fill its available rooms from the average rate upon the use of transcreation services to expand your business’s outreach.
You may be able to gauge the success of your transcreation investment if you notice your occupancy rate increasing, as per your RevPAR increase. This is a simple metric to begin with but there are other ways to measure ROI specifically for transcreation.
TRANSLATION ROI – WHAT EXACTLY DOES THAT MEAN?
ROI doesn’t always have to be the financial returns of your investment. Different companies define ROIs differently, according to their own needs. An increase in ROI may stem from an increase in customer engagement from a particular market.
For example, if you aim to expand into Korea, your ROI would be seeing more Korean customers engaging online with your company to begin with, and perhaps only later, the ensuing increase in Korean guests patronising your establishment.
Every business has a different definition of ROI. Therefore it’s very important to be clear about your goals and the reasons why you are engaging in translation and transcreation services as part of your marketing strategy to begin with.
In setting your goals, these are some of the areas, other than revenue, you can consider keeping track of when measuring ROI:
Market share increase in your business’ global markets
Increase in new clients
Greater brand awareness
Rise in customer satisfaction
Online metrics to measure traffic and hits to your website from your target markets
MEASURE EVERYTHING YOU ARE TRYING TO TRACK
In order to establish your ROI, you will need to set targets for these goals in the areas you have just determined above. Set measurable KPIs for each goal as this will give you the means to gauge if your investment is hitting the mark or not.
For example, in translating your website into Korean, how many percent increase do you hope to eventually see in Korean-speaking guests coming to your establishment.
Other areas to track include:
Revenue vs translation cost
Conversion rate from particular markets
Market share
Country traffic and language
Number of new customers from your target markets
These KPIs will go a long way in measuring your success in investing in transcreation. Your marketing team can then use these metrics, aided by tools and software to track conversions by language and country, helping you see where, how and to what extent transcreation is impacting your business positively.
Quality and cost
The common misconception about ROI is hoping to get the most for your investment while spending the least amount of money.
That may not necessarily work when it comes to translations, as cheap translations may sound attractive at first but ultimately, poor translations will cost you a lot more in the long run in terms of your business reputation and market share, potentially causing conflicts and diverting future customers to your competition.
When looking for a translation partner, bear in mind that transcreation is the better way to go, especially if you are from the Hospitality, Travel, Lifestyle and Retail industry.
Cheap translators are a dime a dozen but don’t expect anything close to decent quality. In fact, ‘cheap quality’ is about as much of an oxymoron as one can get in the world of business, something you might already know.
Remember that this is your brand’s image at stake, so go the extra mile when looking for quality and find yourself someone specific to your industry whom you can trust.
If you are really serious about putting out good stuff for your target audience in the global arena, this means your translated content should bear as much weight as the content in your native or home language.
TRANSLATION ROI AND CUSTOMER SATISFACTION
It’s not often that you will hear the words “ROI” and “customer satisfaction” in the same breath but that doesn’t mean that these two goals are incompatible.
In fact, an excellent way to ensure that you’re going about your business the right way is to look at whether the customers from your target market or country are happy and satisfied and if they keep coming back to your establishment, hence increasing your ROI.
Transcreation not only provides them with collaterals that are created specifically in their native language and not forgetting, with their culture in mind, it also shows them how serious you are about your localization efforts and your goal in keeping your customers happy.
You cannot expect them to be google-translating every menu, message or sign on your premises while enjoying a relaxing holiday – they won’t come back and your revenue will inevitably be adversely affected.
HAVE REALISTIC EXPECTATIONS
Just as how creating your brand name took you a while to establish, transcreation is not going to yield ROIs overnight either. It will take some time before you can see the fruits of your investments.
This is why it’s best to start sooner than later when it comes to engaging in a trustworthy partner to help you achieve the market outreach of your aspirations.
Don’t be disheartened. Take heart that in due time, your efforts will be rewarded.
And if you need help, look no farther – IPPWORLD is here to guide and advise you in this next big marketing step for your business.
Want to learn more about our creative translation services? Contact us today.
About IPPWORLD
As a Language Service Provider, IPPWORLD (www.ippworld.com) is a global transcreation (creative translation) agency that assists travel, hotels, hospitality and lifestyle brands, as well as various businesses enhance their engagement strategy in global markets. We provide end-to-end Multilingual Localisation and Transcreation solutions for website content and online booking information. Transcreation encourages higher readership amongst native-language speaking communities, helps drive conversions, grows revenue and builds brand loyalty. To understand how you can better connect with global audiences through transcreation, drop us a mail at creativetranslation@ippworld.com, or connect with Joanne Chan on Linkedin.
