Question for the author community

[mildlyaroused]

A professional translator has an ouput of about 2.5k words a day.

Nice to know that people translating books across entire language barriers still write faster than me.

 

[madelinemasoch]

Nice to know that people translating books across entire language barriers still write faster than me.

Same.

 

[darkride]

I've had stories copy/pasted on other sites... I've had my YouTube channels copied too... Never a nice feeling, especially when they are on a site that you can't control - all of these modern bot-created sites that are just click farms...

But to happen as described, all here on the one site of which you are a member - at least you can act. But perhaps it would be a good idea to expand your search... just in case...

 

[ElectricBlue]

I'd report all of the translations and ask for the them to be taken down, because the translator didn't ask your permission.

It's sitting right next to plagiarism because of that, even if there's a credit given to the actual author. What bit of, "ask permission first," don't people understand?

 

[lovecraft68]

Usually when people do this its with good intentions. They enjoy your work and want others to be able to read it which does get you more exposure, and your work is already here for free so being that they did credit you...

But I understand that they should have asked permission first.

Meaning, this is entirely your call. I don't see this as being done in a malicious way, they probably felt it was a good thing.

Maybe contact them and thank them but in the future please ask.

Its not the worst thing that could happen to a story here.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

Given how many translations are terrible, even professionally, I'd want either to have someone knew who knew the language given an opinion, or a disclaimer added, saying that the author had not verified this translation and if in doubt about any details, please refer to the English version.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I work with translators in my non-Lit life. Here's the thing: if it's not done by a professional, it's probably machine-translated and almost certainly crap, even if the "translator" post-edited it. How long are your stories? A professional translator has an ouput of about 2.5k words a day. And no professional translator is going to do that kind of work for free when they could be doing paid work.

Each chapter of that story is around 7k words/2 lit pages [edit: or not!], and the poster has been putting one up every two or three days (though of course that doesn't necessarily mean they're translating at the same rate).

 

[BobbyBrandt]

Obviously there is no money involved here so I'm not sure it's worth getting upset over.

What if the translated story did so well with readers that it won a monthly award on Lit while the original English version didn't?

 

[AlinaX]

What if the translated story did so well with readers that it won a monthly award on Lit while the original English version didn't?

I would be impressed. Irritated, but impressed.

 

[oneagainst]

We're not playing for sheep stations here... ease up a minute on the court orders. I note that everyone has piled on with copyright law, but very few with "never put down to malice what you can put down to incompetence".

If it was done with good intentions, a kind word and an edit to include the link to the originating text would suffice. I would establish that first before getting them excommunicated from Lit for what could be a valuable service to their home-language community.

 

[BrokenSpokes]

I work with translators in my non-Lit life. Here's the thing: if it's not done by a professional, it's probably machine-translated and almost certainly crap, even if the "translator" post-edited it. How long are your stories? A professional translator has an ouput of about 2.5k words a day. And no professional translator is going to do that kind of work for free when they could be doing paid work.

The entire story is 140k words. So far (in this hypothetical) I’m positing they posted 6 of the 8 chapters.

 

[BrokenSpokes]

Each of that story is around 7k words/2 lit pages, and the poster has been putting one up every two or three days (though of course that doesn't necessarily mean they're translating at the same rate).

Not quite. The first two are 2 Lit pages. Then 5, then 4, then 8.

 

[joy_of_cooking]

I'm guessing from the page counts that we're talking about hard landing. If be curious to see the translation.

You asked how I would feel. Without implying you should feel the same, the answer is that I would feel flattered. Translation is incredibly difficult and costs about a quarter or two a word. If they're doing a good job on a 140k story, they're donating tens of thousands of Dollars to making my work accessible to a new audience.

If.

They might also be completely misinterpreting it (all translation is interpretation), in which case my feelings would get a lot more complicated.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Not quite. The first two are 2 Lit pages. Then 5, then 4, then 8.

Ah, I didn't check far enough. Thanks!

 

[THBGato]

My knee jerk reaction is that if they’d asked me I probably would have thought it was neat but since they didn’t I feel incredibly violated.

I absolutely agree with you. They should have asked. As somebody else says above, they should also have sent you the translations to put on your own profile (or, at the very least, a shared one) as it is still fundamentally your creation.

It's such a shame, as this could have been a lovely moment for you. [I saw my wife's reaction when a reader of her YA novel offered to translate it into his minority language as "there are no good books in my language". She accepted.] But this approach is not right at all.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

What if the translated story did so well with readers that it won a monthly award on Lit while the original English version didn't?

Bit of an extreme case.

 

[GinnyPPC]

Spokes,

I've been thinking about this overnight, and I suspect that part of the reason you feel violated is that your right to decide if you wanted your work translated, and also if you wanted them to do the translation, was taken away.

I'm sorry this is happening to you.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

I work with translators in my non-Lit life. Here's the thing: if it's not done by a professional, it's probably machine-translated and almost certainly crap, even if the "translator" post-edited it. How long are your stories? A professional translator has an ouput of about 2.5k words a day. And no professional translator is going to do that kind of work for free when they could be doing paid work.

You of course have a point, but I understood that this author has translated the OP's work into their own native language? If that author also writes in English, then they should be able to do a passable translation at least? Can't be sure but it seems reasonable to me.
I also agree that this was a bullshit move regardless of the intentions. I would PM that person and demand an apology, and depending on the nature of their reply (if sounding sincere and apologetic or not)

-I would either allow the whole thing but demand the inclusion of links to my own page and work along with full credit.

or

-Demand the translation to be taken down, block that person, and call them out publicly on AH.

 

[StillStunned]

You of course have a point, but I understood that this author has translated the OP's work into their own native language? If that author also writes in English, then they should be able to do a passable translation at least? Can't be sure but it seems reasonable to me.

You'd think, but no. Translating is a skill that takes practice. As in, years and years of practice. As my translator colleagues say, just knowing two languages doesn't make you a translator anymore than having ten fingers makes you a piano player.

And post-editing a machine translation is another skill entirely. Done properly, it takes almost as much time and effort as translating. 140k words would take two months' fulltime work, and that's by a professional.

 

[8letters]

Interesting. I've updated my bio to:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
You have my permission to:
* Publish on Literotica a sequel to one of my stories
* Re-write one of my stories to publish on Literotica as long as you make significant changes to it
* Use one of my characters in your Literotica story
* Incorporate one of my sex scenes into your Literotica story
* Translate my stories into another language and post them to Literotica
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

 

[BrokenSpokes]

Interesting. I've updated my bio to:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
You have my permission to:
* Publish on Literotica a sequel to one of my stories
* Re-write one of my stories to publish on Literotica as long as you make significant changes to it
* Use one of my characters in your Literotica story
* Incorporate one of my sex scenes into your Literotica story
* Translate my stories into another language and post them to Literotica
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

You are much more free with your head canon than I ever could be. I can respect that approach. But it can’t be mine.

 

[8letters]

You are much more free with your head canon than I ever could be. I can respect that approach. But it can’t be mine.

It's taken me a long time to get there. LC68 going on and on about someone writing a sequel to one of his stories was the last step for me. Reading his posts, I kept seeing "It's all about me! ME! ME! ME! My stories! My characters! My stories!" Yeah, the sequel wasn't up to LC68's standards. But of course, it wasn't up to LC68's standards as LC68 is one of the best writers on this site.

My attitude is that it shouldn't be about me; it should be about the readers and other authors (in particular wannabe authors). I'd be thrilled if someone were willing to take the time to do a translation of one of my stories - suddenly, a new pool of readers would be able to enjoy that story.

 

[SimonDoom]

This thread, and the various responses to it, raise another, related issue in my view, which is that the Site has a compelling reason, given all the uncertainty and headache over this issue, to clarify exactly what its rules are and upon whom the burden falls to seek or grant permission. The Site is unfortunately vague on this issue. It seems it respects authors' copyrights, but there are obvious cases where authors/members get away with copyright infringement and the Site does nothing, and this raises questions about what the Site's policy really is.

The Site could, and should, do a much better job of advising member/authors exactly what they can and can't do and upon whom the burden of permission falls. It would help if the Site would simply say something like this:

As a member and author at this Site, you agree to respect the authorship and copyrights of other authors. This means that you will not infringe any of the exclusive rights that other authors have in their stories under applicable copyright laws. You agree not to do the following without the express written permission of other authors:

1. Reproduce the text of other stories in your own stories.
2. Write sequels to their stories or stories that incorporate the characters, narrative, or other copyrightable content of their stories, or that would qualify as "derivative works" of their stories under applicable copyright laws.
3. Write translations of their stories.

The burden is on you to seek permission and to obtain express permission to use other authors' works. You should not assume that other authors have granted permission to copy their works, or creative derivative works of their works, by their silence on the issue, or their failure to respond to your request to use their works.

You are free to borrow the general, non-copyrightable ideas contained in the stories of other authors, without permission or attribution. For example, there are stories at this Site based on the "Mailgirl" idea. If you read a "Mailgirl" story at this Site and decide to write your own "Mailgirl" story, you are free to do so without getting permission from, or giving attribution to, the author of the story you read, so long as your story is your own and does not infringe the copyrightable content of the other author's story.

You are responsible for making the determination in the first instance whether you are infringing another author's copyright. If we receive a complaint, we reserve the right, in our sole discretion, to determine whether your story infringes another's story and violates this Site's policies, and we reserve the sole right and discretion to remove your story, and to take other action if acts of infringement continue.

We do not have the ability to vet all stories for whether they infringe upon on the copyrights of other authors' stories. You should not assume that because infringing stories sometimes get past our vetting process that those stories comply with our policy against infringement.

I'm curious what @Laurel and @Manu think.

 

[Boobytrap73]

There are two different approaches that are showing in this thread. First, is it illegal (international agreements, national laws, Lit's site policies)? I don't know the answer but it sounds like it's a gray area.

Second, and easier to answer--is it ethical to translate and repost someone's works without their permission? In my opinion, no.

~BT73

 

[Bamagan]

There are two different approaches that are showing in this thread. First, is it illegal (international agreements, national laws, Lit's site policies)? I don't know the answer but it sounds like it's a gray area.

Second, and easier to answer--is it ethical to translate and repost someone's works without their permission? In my opinion, no.

~BT73

The legal perspective is pretty black and white for almost anyone who can access this site. Unauthorized translations are against the law, and to at least that extent, against the site's policies if it is brought to their attention. The only sliver of grayness would be arguing the translation is 'transformative' and therefore fair use, which would be very unlikely to succeed, although ironically it might be easier to support the more poorly the translation was done.
The ethics will always be more gray because some people simply don't believe intellectual property is real property and act according to that ethical position, which is likely the reason the laws about IP are carefully spelled out.