JR Language will attend GALA’s 5^th annual conference at the end of March 2013. GALA’s acronym stands for Globalization and Localization Association.

We are looking forward to this conference after the fantastic experience we had last year. From Monaco 2012 we got new partners and providers, as well as a myriad of new ideas for the growth and development of JR Language in 2012. Overall we came back energized, and with new technologies to improve quality and the specialization of our translation services.

After checking the conference schedule, we are looking forward to get more insight on the maturity and new developments in Machine Translation; we have big plans for this technology in 2013. We are especially interested in post-editing techniques and measurements for TM.

GALA brings together a diverse and interesting group of people from all areas of the translation industry, among them: language technology developers, translation agencies, localization providers, consultants, and clients. Presentations will continue to focus on the tag line of the organization: “The language of business and the business of language”. This year the keynote speaker is stressing the importance of embracing technology, in general but, particularly in localization and translation services.

We are also interest in the updates on localization standards and connectivity between applications and translation tools.

Stay tuned for JRL’s summary of this important conference, which gathers representatives and players from all industries and countries of the world.

After reading Sophie Pitman’s blog post about the 2012 London Olympics’ Opening Ceremony, I can’t help but wonder: What went wrong (and what happened to Elton John)? On her post she explains how amazed she was after receiving many emails from her American friends who were totally lost by some elements of the ceremony. Maybe this is the reason why China decided four years ago to give the world a pyrotechnic show instead of one filled with historical references.

Although the United State and the United Kingdom share the English language, they do not share the same historical evolution, which creates a significant cultural gap. For this reason and, as Pitman points out, NBC should have had a British commentator to explain the elements that could have seem obscure to the American audience. Obscure as the giant baby born before our own eyes; maybe some of us did not take advanced English Literature and did not read Paradise Lost (if you read John Milton you realize that Cruella De Vil and Lord Voldemort were completely appropriate).  What surprised me the most was that her friends did not recognized Kenneth Branagh! Most of us have  read and watched countless versions of Shakespeare’s plays; I am sure the younger generations recognized him as Professor Lockhart from Harry Potter.

The Opening Ceremony was not the occasion to globalize but the perfect one to localize; after all the whole idea was to highlight what is intrinsically British, the good and the bad (very moving the commemoration of the War to End All Wars) but also, a local perspective would have helped understand what was happening.

Sports inspire universal values: Unity, Friendship, Equality, Patriotism and, maybe, this is where the Ceremony failed. Maybe they were too patriotic; maybe they failed at conveying a more global message that not only gave the world an in-depth vision of the United Kingdom but made the world feel welcome and part of it.

Fortunately we, at JR Language, know the difference between globalization and localization, and can help in deciding which is best for each situation so that our clients can benefit from it and prevent their copy from getting lost in translation.

JR Language Translation Services Inc.  will be attending the 2012 GALA Conference in Monaco from March 25^th to the 28th. GALA 2012 is the fourth annual Language of Business conference hosted by the Globalization and Localization Association (GALA). GALA promotes communication between its members, 275 companies in 50 countries .The conference will be a great forum to display multilingual strategies and proven tools to aid  global business efforts.

The conference will be covering important subjects  for the Language industry, some of the relevant topics of the gathering are: Machine Translation, Localization Standards, Globalization and content development, Quality in Translation, Multilingual and International SEO Strategies, cloud-based and server-based translation technology among others.

Jackie and Sergio from our company will participle in the CEO Forum, will go to the conference workshop “TAUS” Open Source Machine Translation Showcase on Sunday and will attend the 3 days of sessions.

If you are interested in meeting up with someone from JR language Translation Services during the conference, please contact jacqueline.dempaire@jrlanguage.com or sergio.ruffolo@jrlanguage.com