The main reason this is powerful as a learning method is because it simulates interaction which is proven to be more engaging than traditional methods. You can also practice more extensively without the need of tiring out another human being, as well as saving yourself from the possible intimidation of facing somebody and struggling to communicate.

In the future we will easily be able to simulate life-like scenarios including ordering food in a restaurant, going on a date in a coffee shop or even sitting in an airplane – the potential is limitless. This functional and practical learning method will set language learners up for much more efficient use of language in everyday scenarios and more importantly, let them do it in a fun and deeply engaging way. It is also not a bad tool for kid’s party entertainment either.

For more information about virtual reality and how it can be used in a manner of different ways, you can contact VR Base, a London-based virtual reality equipment hire specialist firm.

The post Is Virtual Reality Language Learning of the Future? appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

The song itself has been remixed and repackaged to the English speaking world which features Canadian pop artist Justin Bieber to help the song gain popularity in English speaking countries and there is also an official Portuguese translation for the song featuring Brazilian singer Israel Novaes replacing Daddy Yankee.

The official video has amassed nearly 3 billion views on YouTube which many believe will become the most viewed YouTube video of all time as well accumulating a whopping 4.6 billion streams and counting leading Despacito to become the most streamed song in history as you can imagine the retail translation is big bucks.

But for those of us who do not possess the skills to understand or speak Spanish enjoy the songs melodic and rhythmic tone coincided with the reggaeton beats we could be forgiven thinking that Despacito is nothing more than a happy, innocent Latin American song. Well it turns out when translated into English the lyrics are more sinister than we might have originally thought.

You see the lyrics to the pop-reggaeton track are actually quite edgy with lines such as “Let me trespass your danger zones” and “I want to see your hair dance” it would be a big surprise that if the song was in English it would have even received the go ahead to be released let alone parents playing Fonsi and Daddy Yankee in front of their kids. Some of the lyrics get even more X-rated and you can see the full translation here on Billboards website.

Despacito’s lyrics were even considered bad enough in Malaysia to see the government ban the song from government-owned media platforms due to be “un-Islamic” and “not suitable to be heard” whilst advising other radio stations to follow suit.

But as the song is just so catchy we can just use the excuse that we don’t understand it and enjoy it anyway. Let us know what you think of the lyrics.

The post The real meaning behind Despacito appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

James runs a popular nightclub in New Your City called Truth. Besides being a family man and business man James is also a major player in a drug ring amassing millions of dollars at which point he is now trying to get out of the drug game in order to focus on his more legitimate ventures. He also battles between choosing to stay with his wife and mother of his children when he reconnects with his childhood sweetheart which has contributed to all the drama we all crave in a series. The show has cast actors/characters from diverse backgrounds and in turn you will often hear the characters speak in languages such as Albanian where the Albanian Mafia are after Ghost or conversations in Spanish. These Non-English conversations on the show are very limited and when they do occur subtitles and transcriptions are often available for the viewer.

**Minor Spoiler Alert**

In the most recent episode which appeared on Netflix one of the main characters Angela Valdez who is James’s childhood sweetheart is shown speaking to her sister about knowing about some valuable evidence which sufficed suggesting that he was innocent of a murder he was accused of. For most of the conversation she is heard speaking to her sister in Spanish however there was no Spanish translation provided! Now for anyone who has been following Power knows how passionate the fans of power are often flocking to social media platforms like Instagram or Twitter to vent their frustrations at the actors playing the characters despite this being all fictional. The fact that people could not understand what was being said in Spanish sparked many angry fans to take to twitter and bash Netflix on the mishap.

One viewer Gustavo took to twitter and wrote “The makers of Power must’ve just assumed everyone learned how to understand Spanish in episode 5 with these non subtitled conversations ?”.

The makers of Power must’ve just assumed everyone learned how to understand Spanish in episode 5 with these non subtitled conversations ?

— Gustavo (@delanowebley) July 25, 2017

Another twitter user called ‘Warning Track Power’ vented their frustration and tweeted “Don’t call asking if we speak Spanish. This is America we speak English or get yourself a damn translator”.

Don’t call asking if we speak Spanish. This is America we speak English or get yourself a damn translator

— Warning Track Power (@Butta1231) July 24, 2017

More tweets surfaced with some directing their frustrations directly @Netflix:

*Angela and her sister switching from English to Spanish during their conversation*

Me tryna figure out why:#Power #PowerTV pic.twitter.com/j2jjCvIz2G

— Unknown Beauty (@2beAbeauty) July 23, 2017

Why has power not put subtitles on any the Spanish for that episode do a look like a understand it ???

— Gary (@gspence26) July 24, 2017

@NetflixUK there were no subtitles during this episode of Power for the Spanish speaking scenes!! Can this be fixed?

— Cam (@Camz_Rozay) July 24, 2017

One thing for sure is that Power fans are extremely passionate about the show and its characters. Surely someone at Netflix is fixing the technical glitch that occurred or perhaps Netflix requires some professional translation services?

The post Why Non Spanish Speaking Power Fans Are Angry At Netflix appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

But regardless the discussion of whether machine translation software’s like Google translate will ever be taking over professional human translators remains a hotly debated topic, and of course with all the advancements in technology within the past couple of years and all the different applications and gizmos who is to say that the day when machine trumps man in the translation fields is not closer than you think?

Imagine the world in just a few years where you could be getting your Portuguese translation services from a machine or even further down the line when you can receive localisation services from a robot!

Of course this is just an exaggeration, but we are not truly sure of what the effects or what role these new machine translations will have on the translation and interpreting industry but one thing is for sure they are not good now and we should still make fun of them whilst we have the chance.

This is exactly what television host and comedian Jimmy Fallon decided to do when he dedicated a segment of his popular late night talk show ‘The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon’ or ‘At night show stars Fallon Jimmy’ to which Fallon describes is the shows name once it has been translated through Google into Hungarian and back into English.

The skit itself is named ‘Google translate songs’ and uses the same rules with three songs  being translated into Hungarian and back into English and the twice Google translated lyrics had to be sung by show guest and Actress Anne Hathaway and Fallon himself backed up with live music from the soulful hip-hop band, The Roots.

The songs included Hathaway singing The Weeknd’s “Can’t Feel My Face” which is translated hilariously to “My front is not felt”, whilst Fallon took on the new translated version of the old Gloria Gaynor classic “I will survive” which is now “I will be punctual” and finally the pair came together for a duet of Pink and Nate Ruess’ “Just Give Me a Reason” which became a nonsensical “Only tell me grounds.”

Have look at the full video below and tell us what you think.

The post Google translate songs? appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

However whether you are using professional Mandarin translation services for legal documents or are just trying to get an Italian translation for something like “Where are the toilets?” One thing is for sure, they better be spot on! As one Tanzanian tourist guide found out.

A Tanzanian tourist guide who goes by the name of Saimon Sirikwa and works at one of the ten natural travel wonders of the world, the Northern Tanzanian Serengeti National Park was arrested and charged with breaching Tanzania’s cybercrime laws by producing what they are calling a ‘fake translation’ of a tourists words from English into Swahili in a video he uploaded onto his Facebook page. Here is what was said in the video:

Tourist: “Hi. My visit to Tanzania has been beautiful, gorgeous. The people are fabulously wonderful and friendly. Greetings are always jambo (“Hello” in Swahili). Happy to be here. The land is beautiful, beautiful. The animals are wonderful.”

Tour guide (translating into Swahili): “You Tanzanians complain/cry a lot about hunger. Every day you cry about hunger when you have flowers at home. Why don’t you boil the flowers and drink them. It is not good to cry/complain about hunger.”

Tourist: “The variety of animals and people you see is incredible, unlike anywhere else. It is just fabulous.”

Tour guide: “You are asking your president to cook for you. Do you think your president is a cook? Can you get busy, even boil your clothing and eat.”

Tourist: “It will be an experience to savour for all of your life. It is fantastic and beautiful and incredible and just unremarkable.”

Tour guide: “Get busy in every corner of the country. The president can’t leave State House to cook for you. You have to cook for yourselves.”

Despite Mr Sirikwa, who is known to be a comedian where he has been seen to regularly post comedy videos on his Facebook page, posting a second video with the tourist from the original video explaining it was all a joke and his love for his country as well as apologising to anyone offended. 

He was still accused of putting the Tanzanian tourism in a ‘bad light’ according to the police. With the regional police commander telling the BBC there was sufficient evidence to back up these claims that Mr Sirikwa had breached the legislation. The cybercrime law which was introduced in 2015 had been deemed to give the police “too much power” by politicians and activists alike. According to the BBC some correspondents noted that Mr Sirikwa’s joke translation was not unlike the words uttered by Tanzanian President John Magufuli when he told people at a rally to stop complaining about hunger.

So you can make your own mind up about that one. Let us know your thoughts.

The post How ‘fake’ translation services got this man in deep trouble appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

Just a reminder the human translators were represented by four professional translators who were pitted against three artificial intelligent (AI) machine translators which consisted of the western world behemoth Google translate from Google Inc. based in the USA, the self-learning hybrid translation software Systran machine translator from Systran International and Naver’s Papago from Naver Inc. which is Korea’s leading internet provider. All seven competitors were given 50 minutes to translate two random English articles into Korean and then two Korean articles to translate into English.

So standing in the red corner, they have been walking this Earth for roughly 200,000 years, they have risen to the top of the food chain, countless languages spoken and an unknown amount created; we have the Human “Homo sapiens” Translators! (CHEERS) And in the blue corner we have the younger, faster, and created by humans but maybe better than humans; Machine “Robot” Translators! (Boo’s obviously.) LET’S GET READY TO RUMBLEEEE!!!! Of course that’s not really how it happened but that’s how we like to think it might have happened.

It was tense, it was difficult, it was one hell of a battle, after all the pride of all translators and professional translation agencies and humans everywhere was on the line. But just as the bookies predicted the fan favourites, and still the champions of the translation world, the Humans did in fact come out on top. With the professional translators delivering the knockout blows by scoring an average out of 30, a massive 25 on the scorecard whilst the AI/machine translators scoring only between 10 and 15 for Korean translation services.

But man’s triumph over machine may not last so long, with more advancement the gap will surely be closing, with the NMT progressing and learning more it is only a matter of time before the machines take over hopefully not any time soon.

The post And the winner is: A translation battle appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

In the UK we are all too familiar with the battle of Christmas TV adverts mainly from companies such as John Lewis and Marks and Spencer’s who use their advertisements to manipulate our emotions like any advert to be fair but these certain ads always seem to garner so much more attention so it is reasonable to say that it plays a key role in how well these companies are likely to perform over the Christmas period so much so that they are prepared to spend millions in order to see a huge financial translation in sales.

But this year even though Buster the Boxer ad by John Lewis and the Amazon ad involving an Imam and a Priest, just to name a few have caught the eyes of many this year in the lead up to Christmas in the UK there is one advert that has seemingly topped them all, not from John Lewis, M&S in fact not even from the UK.

The ad in conversation is from Poland by Polish based online auction website Allegro. The advert has been viewed nearly 13 million times on YouTube and is titled ‘English for beginners.’  This heart-warming advert begins with an elderly man receiving a package from Allegro which consists of Polish to English translation audiobooks as well as English for beginner’s books. He then gets himself completely immersed in the English language in the following comedic scenes which involves putting sticky notes with English words on objects around the house including his dog as well as copying rude phrases he hears from the movie.

Eventually we see the man as he prepares to board a flight which sees him arrive in the UK to a nice house where he embraces his son who now lives there with his wife when rather timidly, a little girl appears out of a room to which he walks up to her and says “HI, I am your grandfather”. The conclusion was he learnt to speak English in order to be able to speak to his granddaughter the first time he met her. The response for social media was massive with many saying that this is the best Christmas ad ever and even more saying they shed tears just watching it.

We dare you not to cry!

Image by: Art DiNo

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Translators and interpreters across the world who are there to keep their respective nations up to date on what is one of the most widely publicised presidential debates of any country to date are finding themselves in a bit of a bother when it comes to providing a fast translation service of Trump’s speeches in their native tongues. As if translating political affairs into other languages isn’t sensitive and tricky enough, translators have to deal with Trump’s unorthodox way of speaking which could sometimes yield some interesting results.

One twitter user @tylerantichrist commented on an interpreter providing German translation services on a German radio show for the elections that she felt sorry for the interpreter as he had explained his friends teased him because he had to first emphasise with Trump in order to quickly translate his comments into German.

There is also an example on The Huffington Post showing trump’s misogynistic and offensive language which has had a Mandarin translation which actually makes him sound worse. The words that have been translated makes his comments sound even more sexist and sometimes racist in other languages. On the other hand when some of his harsh and brash comments are translated into other languages it sometimes has the reverse effect and makes his tone sound softer when his intentions may be otherwise. For instance he was criticised and mocked for rudely interrupting and shouting “Wrong!” but when translated into Spanish “Es falso” which means that is not true actually made him sound civil.

With less than two weeks to go until America elects a new president, whether its Hilary or Donald, whether you love or hate Donald Trump, you can’t say he’s not entertaining.

Image credit: Gage Skidmore

The post Why Trump’s comments are an ‘impossible’ translation service appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

Chaz Hutton a 32 year old Australian living in London posted his humorous and very spot on interpretations of everyday life on his Instagram page @instachaaz which has since gone viral and amassed an impressive following of over 150k followers.  His witty humour and accurate interpretations of what goes on in everyday life is so eye catching that you may find yourself spending the rest of your lunch break scrolling through his Instagram page laughing at your smartphone screen leaving your work colleagues wondering whether you have lost the plot!

Chaz who told BBC Trending he did not have the patience to be an architect so drawing things on sticky notes “seemed like a step in the right direction” has even gone on to land a book publishing deal and has released his book ‘A Sticky Note Guide to Life’ both as a hardcover and Kindle edition on Amazon. He has even been branded as the “world’s first sticky note lifestyle guru” according to the book description on Amazon.

So if you’re down in your career get creative you too could be the next social media sensation.

All images credited to Chaz Hutton and published on his Instagram page @instachaaz.

The post How one man’s scribble earned him a book publishing appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

With the help of translation services Disney are able to have an impact on generations or young children around the world. Whether you are young or old you will know at least a few of the Disney films, characters and songs to go with the films.

Whether you grew up watching the first feature film released by Disney in 1937, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Disney’s main character Micky Mouse who made his first appearance in ‘Fantasia’ (1940), or other iconic characters both new and old such as Pinocchio, Dumbo, Bambi, Cinderella, Mulan, Minnie Mouse, Mary Poppins, Winnie the Pooh, Aladdin, the list just goes on and on. All of the movies that have starred these Disney characters have been viewed and translated across the globe from French, Italian, Mandarin, Spanish, Hebrew and even a Romanian translation!

So it is good news for the generation of 20 and 30 somethings that one of the movies of ‘their time’ has finally had a translation, albeit not a very fast translation as it comes a whole 22 years after its initial release. The film in question is none other than the timeless classic The Lion King which takes place in a kingdom of lions in Africa, details the story a lion named Simba who is the son of the king Mufasa who is murdered by his brother to succeed him as king, basically a lion version of Hamlet. The story features many elements amongst others are a love story, coming of age, betrayal, and a song from Elton John.

However one of the most popular takeaways of the film is the start of the song ‘The Circle of Life’. Most of us don’t even know or thought about what the words are but the direct English translation has now been revealed. Rather than most of our renditions of the start which resemble a shouting rambles of a madman, the words are actually of the Zulu language “Nants ingonyama bagithi Baba / Sithi uhm ingonyama” (you definitely tried to sing it whilst reading) and the translation of this familiar line is not what you would expect but after 22 years waiting we can finally reveal the translation to be *drum roll* “There comes a lion. Oh yes, it’s a lion.”

Pretty underwhelming and absolutely sounds better in Zulu but those who were having sleepless nights trying to figure out what it meant can now rest easy at night.

Image: Pedro Plassen Lopes

The post You won’t believe what this famous Disney line’s English translation is appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

Luckily for you we are here to help and have put together just some of the current trending French lingo surrounding the UEFA European Championships 2016. Here is a list of French to English translations of some of the most trending general French footballing terms.

Let’s start with an obvious one ‘Les Bleus’ or ‘Allez les Bleus’ which is the most popular chant or saying when it comes to roaring on the French national team. The English translation is ‘The Blues’ or ‘Come on the Blues’, so England fans should use the term ‘Allez les Anglais/Angleterre’ which in French would be ‘Come on the English/England’ but in all honesty you are better off getting Italian translation services and backing Italy this tournament but, we still believe!

Another catchphrase the French are using in support of the national team is ‘fiers d’être bleu’ which means ‘proud to be Blue’ something that immediately sends out positive French patriotic signals. Now how can a proud Englishman respond to this? Shout back ‘Allez les trois lions!’ or ‘Come the three lions!’

Now one thing that has been so successful about these Euros, other than the late drama and intense matches has been the fanzone or ‘le fanzone’. Fairly simple to remember you just put ‘le’ instead of ‘the’ and your best but none the less dodgy French accent and that’s how you say the fanzone. The most popular fanzone is based in the French capital Paris which is free of charge and open to the public. With the commercial success of this tournament resulting in a very positive financial translation so far, these free-to-use fanzones have been a major success.

Last but not least the French use the term ‘Le 12ème homme’ or the English translation, ‘The 12^th man’ something that we use already to liken the fans to an extra player on the pitch. There are many more footballing terms but these should see you up to England’s usual final stage, the quarter finals. But you never know with Jamie Vardy on the team.

Who do you think will win the Euros?

Image: Patrice CALATAYU

The post How to support England in ‘French’ at Euro 2016 appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

The advert in question was one commissioned by the Shanghai Leishang Cosmetics Ltd for their Qiaobi laundry detergent. There are no words spoken in the video so there was no need for retail translations services as mostly comical music and sound effects were used.

It features a young Asian actress and a black actor, the actor who has paint marks on his face from working, eyes the woman who is assumed to be the homeowner who smiles back at the man whilst standing beside a washing machine. He ‘wolf-whistles’ the woman then approaches her and puts his hands on her waist and goes in for a kiss, the woman at this point stuffs a washing tablet into his mouth and throws him into the washing machine where you hear comical screams as the lady sits on top of the lid to keep it shut, let’s be honest in reality that would be brutal and lead to a prison sentence. After the cycle has finished and most shockingly a fair-skinned Asian man emerges from the washing machine much to the woman’s adulation. He then holds the brands product to the screen and winks.

Now you don’t need Mandarin translation services to tell you what is going on here, in fact this advert will translate into any language in the world as a massive mistake.

After all this global condemning and outrage of the advert Leishang Cosmetics have apologised for any ‘harm’ they caused to African people and expressed their condemnation of racial discrimination. They also went on further to say that they take full responsibility of the content and that the media have ‘over-amplified’ the situation. Make of that what you will.

What are your thoughts on this? Have they gone too far or is this simply naivety?

The post Is this the most racist advert ever? appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

But there are many reasons that this type of global release has not been done before with one major and very obvious reason being the language barriers that are prevalent. Imagine the issues of trying to get a Hebrew translation of “There are two kinds of people I don’t trust: people who don’t drink and people who collect stickers.” That is an example, a rather pre-watershed example of Chelsea Handler’s joke; would that even translate well into another language?

That’s not the only problem that Netflix have had to deal with. There is the issue of getting each translated version of the show done in time and ready for release as well as localised for different variations of the languages. That is the precise reason that they have assembled a team of 200 linguists selected from a pool of 5000 to provide translations and localisation services to make sure that the jokes are understood worldwide. Amongst the linguists includes ‘dirty’ words specialist for Handler’s unconventional humour.

The show is recorded live 34 hours before it is released on Netflix. To help make the translations quicker and smoother, Netflix creates a live transcript in English which someone then reiterates into voice recognition software for the waiting translators and language experts who sift through the transcript to highlight any non-formal English words or idioms that might be a problem to localise. This then leaves the translators with just a 12 hour turnaround time to translate the show into the 20 languages that Netflix are aiming for it to be available in, then a 90 minute safety cushion in case anything goes wrong. This massive operation is all done so you could have the Portuguese translation of the show exactly at the same time as the English version.

The post Fast translation services like no other appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

Even though there is a huge dominance from Disney and a big demand for their films in China when it comes to ‘imported’ movies, there is also an opposition from parts of the Chinese population. A Chinese military newspaper was quoted that America were using “invisible propaganda” within their films which prompted a People’s Liberation Army academy professor to state “Hollywood has long been an effective propaganda machine for the U.S. by using blockbuster films to promote U.S. values and global strategy,” then going on to say “In a world of cruel reality, it is always a wolf that eats a sheep instead of the other way round. Such a fundamental concept that even a child could understand was easily turned around by Hollywood.”

These comments are not just from a few people, the Chinese authorities do not agree with Western values and have been making efforts to clamp down on them in films, television, the internet and textbooks whilst even going as far as releasing guidelines to protect the national identity. Although there are a lot of Chinese people on social media platforms such as WeChat and Weibo who have ridiculed the newspaper as “overthinking” the whole issue.

Although there is a Chinese backlash to ‘American ways’ surprisingly Disney actually have decided to keep the direct Mandarin translation of Captain America instead of having it changed for political reasons, a move which had been taken in other countries such as South Korea and Russia.

Captain America had been rebranded in Russia and South Korea to a rather less American glorifying “First Avenger” in an attempt at the localisation of the film to audiences who, let’s just say might not be the biggest fans of the USA, although the name still fits as it is often referred to as The Avengers 2.5.

The post Captain America set to keep Mandarin translation appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

It turns out that the Tekitanka was performed not by the actual Milan players but rather actors which were made to look like the players and that this was in fact all a big publicity stunt by the clubs sponsor the skincare company Nivea. The words “uomini questo e il vostro ritual” was seen across the stadiums advertisement boards, the English translation is “Men, this is your ritual” with the players acting out washing their faces and applying the cream instead of the actual battle cry. The Haka is a traditional war cry or dance performed by the Maori’s of New Zealand. The dance was usually performed by warriors before battle and has been used and made famous worldwide by the New Zealand national rugby team the All Blacks who perform it before a match to strike fear into their opponents.

Here’s how the AC Milan ‘actors’ performed:

Image: YouTube

Image: YouTube

As you could imagine there has been a major backlash to both Nivea and AC Milan which has seen people on social media declare the stunt as a ‘cheap rip-off’, ‘fake’ and ‘culturally insensitive’ amongst others which has led Nivea to issue an apology. A statement from Nivea’s parent company Beiersdorf sent to Mashable Australia read “NIVEA Men has organized a one off activity before the match AC Milan – Carpi on April 21. Actors were wearing the shirts of AC Milan and have performed a dance – inspired by the HAKA Maori dance. It was never our intention to offend anyone. We are truly sorry if this has happened.”

Maybe they should have sought professional localisation services first or maybe not done it at all.

Here’s how the ‘real’ Haka is done performed by the All Blacks.

The post What’s the Italian translation for ‘Haka’? appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

But one other big issue they face is the sheer fact that the Chinese culture has many differences when compared to western cultures. This means that the way they market their products and services will differ from say the US market. That is why for years big businesses have been producing products and promotions specifically for the Chinese markets with the help of good Localisation services to pinpoint Chinese culture.

But this tactic has not always been seen as successful; in fact sometimes theses localisation attempts have been near disaster and some to comical effect. Some of these products and promotions backfired and were mocked amongst Chinese people. A popular Chinese fashion blogger on Weibo called ‘Gogoboi’ shared these localisation fails amongst his 5 million followers. Business Insider, with the help of a global brand consulting firm, Landor managed to compile a list of top five times global brands absolutely failed in China.

5. Nike

This is truly a case of retail translation services gone wrong when Nike had an idea to release special edition trainers with Mandarin characters sewn into the pair. On the left trainer was “Fa” which means “Getting Rich” and on the right trainer was “Fu” which translates as “Fortune arrives,” which doesn’t sound too bad. But when you put them together it means “Getting fat” definitely not what the biggest sportswear company should be promoting.

4. Louis Vuitton

The high-end fashion house Louis Vuitton is the next culprit in these localisation faux pas. Maybe with good intentions or maybe naivety decided to honour the Chinese year of the Monkey by releasing a special edition necklace, which can only be described as an odd looking, gold finished necklace vaguely resembling  a monkey. In which Gogoboi’s followers described as “creepy,” “like an alien,” and ironically a “knock-off” considering it retailed at $2,450 (£1,720). Ouch!

Image via: Louis Vuitton

3. Dior

Dior, another massive French brand of luxury goods committed a near enough exact offence as Louis Vuitton. Dior also saw fit to release a monkey-inspired piece of jewellery to celebrate the year of the monkey but the limited edition “Diorelita” was rather underwhelmingly likened to a ‘piece of red rope’, probably not the type of response Dior where looking for.

2. Givenchy

Another Chinese year of the monkey inspired product fail, another French fashion brand behind the failure. This time it is Givenchy had used images of not so much your typical chimpanzee looking monkeys but rather images of orangutans, which needless to say left Gogoboi’s followers largely unimpressed. Fail!

1. Burberry

Last but not least comes another fail celebrating the Chinese New Year, this time from up-market UK brand Burberry. They had made a different error to the rest; they decide to release their classic print scarf in a special edition with the Mandarin character “Fu” which as previously mentioned means “fortune arrives” printed in red which didn’t go down well as a design with Gogoboi’s following. But the main error was that when worn “Fu” was displayed upright which in Chinese culture “Fu” needs to be upside down to actually carry its meaning which is “beckoning in fortune.” As the special edition scarf retails $215 (£150) more at $925 (£649) that unsurprisingly left people totally bemused.

The post 5 times retail translation and localisation services failed in China appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

Reports by Russia’s News state news agency RIA Navosti stated that words relating to Russia and one of its politicians were improperly translated from Ukrainian to Russian. The words that were interpreted were insulting and demeaning to Russia and its people. The words in question include the phrase Russian Federation which translated into Russian as Mordor when inserted into Google translate. Mordor is a fictional place in the world created by writer J. R. R. Tolkien which is most known for its depiction the Lord of the Rings as an evil place where cruelties such as torture are an occurrence. Newsweek reported that Pro-Ukranian groups took to the term when referring to Russia. Newsweek also reported that when translating the last name of Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov, the machine translation interpreted his name as ‘sad-little-horse’. Another glitch which was spotted was the word Russians which when translated from Ukrainian read as ‘occupiers’ in the Russian language.

Whether or not this was a result of successful hacking or perhaps just a machine error, Google did respond by saying that Google Translate “worked by looking for patterns in hundreds of millions of documents but translation remained difficult as the meaning of words was tied to the context in which they were used”. “This means that not all translations are perfect, and there will sometimes be mistakes or mistranslations”.

Such happenings always create a debate as to whether platforms such as google translate are reliable when it comes to website content translation or even Russian financial document translation to be specific. Google has stated that ‘although translations are conducted automatically it is possible for users to suggest alternative translations manually’ which can sometimes leave room for biased results. The best way to be sure to receive an accurate translation is to use translation services by human translators especially when you are translating for work, legal or educational purposes.

Have a comment about this? Let us know your thoughts below.

The post How accurate is Google Translate when Russia is translated to ‘Mordor’ appeared first on Exchange Lingo.

The advert in question was a radio advert that aired on Australian radio to promote Aldi’s whiskey range. The advert features a Scotsman who announces himself as the head distiller for Aldi’s own-brand whisky accompanied by the unmistakable sound of bagpipes whilst an Englishwoman supplies a voiceover for the Scotsman for a fast translation into ‘English’ despite the Scot’s objections that he is already speaking English.

The advert received a complaint of racism from an expat Scottish national which prompted the Australian Advertising Board to investigate. The complainant who was not impressed, explained how the advert depicts the stereotype that Scots are hard to understand and insisted if it were an aboriginal who received a translation service there would be an ‘uproar’ and question why it was ok to be ‘racist’ towards the Scottish.

The complaint however was rejected by the board who stipulated that the promotion was intended to be more humorous rather than racist. The board ruled that the advert suggest that the Scottish man’s accent is likely to be harder to understand to the average person but is in fact completely clear and the use of a translator adds to the humour of the advert. They also state it is not acceptable to make fun of a person’s accent regardless of nationality but in this case it is the translator that is the one that looks ‘silly’ because there is no need for her translation whilst the Scotsman is not presented with a negative stereotype at all.

Aldi had commented to the board saying that this is just one of a series of light-hearted advertisements which will see other accents such as the French and New Zealand accents used in the same way.

Photo credit: Mike Mozart

What are your thoughts?

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As Disney is one of the most popular brands of all time and their timeless films have seen many generations grown up with them over time, everyone is likely to have a favourite. With the release of each movie comes a new star and for some a new favourite and due to the massive influence Disney has around the world multiple different translations are released for everyone to interpret.

You can watch all your favourite Disney princesses sing their songs in the way that nature intended it. You can actually hear Mulan who is Chinese sing “Reflection” in the Mandarin translation; you can see the Norwegian rendition of the massive hit “Let it go” by Elsa from Frozen. Also there are other classic tunes like the Arabic version of “A whole new world” sung by Jasmine from Aladdin and Snow White from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs singing German.

There are many more languages in each of the princess’s native tongue such as Belle from beauty and the Beast in French, The little Mermaid, Ariel in Danish, Megara from Hercules in Greek, Rapunzel from Tangled in German  and many more, all of which just further add to the beauty of each song. Check them out for yourself below.

Part 1:

Part 2:

What do you think of these versions? Let us know below.

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The only problem is he wants a kiss, a move which has seen the advert and the actor himself widely criticised and been branded as ‘creepy’ and claims that the actor in the video is ‘sexually harassing’ the local women. This is after it appears in the video that some of the women did not react well to his advances with one even running away and another hitting him with her hand bag. Although not all the women seen in the video were afraid some actually responded well with giggles and one even reciprocating his advances and gives him a quick kiss in the final scene.

But all this outcry of harassment of these unsuspecting women have been shut down by the translation gadgets CEO who told BBC trending it was all an act and in fact all of the women involved in this video, seen as tasteless by some were all in on the act and were all paid actresses. The pressure of the negative reaction has seen the video now have a disclaimer saying everyone involved in the video are all paid actors. That however hasn’t stopped criticism of the advert to which some think is very low brow and degrading to oriental women and some even claiming that it adds to the stereotype that if you are European in Asia you can do as you like.

Whatever your views on this advert you cannot deny the fact that it has garnered much attention albeit which has seen it go viral and received more than five million views online. As the saying goes ‘All publicity is good publicity.’

What are your views?

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1 – Cilla Black

The number one most searched topic of 2015 in Britain was the sad news of the passing of the widely adored TV and showbiz legend Cilla Black. The much loved Liverpudlian singer, real name Priscilla Maria Veronica White whose singing career spanned several generations passed away at her Spanish home earlier this year on 1^st August 2015 much to the nations shock, her untimely death was met with tributes from all walks of life, she was 72.

Credit: Andy Butterton/PA Archive/Press Association Images

2 – Lady Colin Campbell

She is one of the stars from the 2015 edition of the hit ITV show ‘I’m a Celebrity, Get Me out Of Here!’ But the Jamaican born socialite and royal family biographer was not popular amongst her campmates, but that did not stop our fascination of 66 year old as she was one of the most searched people by Britons in 2015. She exited the programme due to medical reasons.

3 – Rugby World Cup

There were many sporting highlights for us to salivate over this year, the premier league which saw this seasons relegation candidates Chelsea crowned as champions the season before, high profile boxing fights such as the long awaited Mayweather vs Pacquiao and a somewhat renaissance in British Boxing with the likes of Tyson Fury, Anthony Joshua and Kell Brook all finding success. But even in a year where the England cricket team retained the Ashes, there was one sporting event that had Britain searching for that was The 2015 Rugby World Cup. Hosted in England for the first time since 1991, Stuart Lancaster’s men were humbled as they were knocked out in the group stages. Stuart Lancaster as well as some of his underperforming stars were axed from the squad thereafter.

4 – Jeremy Clarkson

The enigma that is Jeremy Clarkson, you either love him or you hate him but you can’t doubt his charisma. One of the most highly paid people of the BBC and the face of popular motor vehicle/entertainment program Top Gear, the often controversial Clarkson found himself briefly out of work for a period; why? The BBC decided against renewing his contract as he was embroiled in an incident in which a ‘punch’ was thrown by Clarkson which led to him being suspended, dropped then axed completely. This event subsequently led to co presenters Richard Hammond and James May also leaving the program before all three were signed by Amazon for a rival program. Chris Evans will present Top Gear next year.

5 – Paris

The final most trending topic was that of the Paris attacks in which 130 people lost their lives. The devastating attack on the French capital was the worst attack made on the European continent for 10 years. The news spread around the world so fast translations of the story were reported in a matter of minutes.

So there you have it these are the top five stories that spiked our interests in 2015 according to Google. What has 2016 got in store for us? Hopefully more positives, one thing left is to wish everyone a happy new year!

Let us know your thoughts

You can read more trending topics of 2015 Telegraph.

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So to celebrate the launch of the release of Disney’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens, here are 10 things about Star Wars you might not know; well those who are not die hard fans.

1. Created by George Lucas in the early 70’s, Star Wars (Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope) was released in 1977 after many changes due to originally being rejected.

2. Many if the buildings that were built in Tunisia to depict the desert planet of Tatooine are in fact still standing and are in use by the locals. Coincidently the planet Tatooine was named after the city it was built in Tataouine, Tunisia.

3. The name Luke Skywalker which is synonymous with the Star Wars series might not have been. The name Luke Starkiller was originally intended right up until filming began.

4. Greedo’s language is actually a South American language called Quechua, not the only real language used in Star Wars as the language of the Jawas is actually based on a sped up version of Zulu, and the Ewoks speak a hybrid of Nepalese and Tibetan.

5. We all know what the wise Grand Master of the Jedi Order, trainer of Luke Skywalker Yoda looks like. Now imagine him as a cane carrying monkey with a mask because that was the original intended appearance of the wise one.

6. There is somewhat of a running gag in that the lines “I have a very bad feeling about this” or “I have a bad feeling about this” are uttered in every movie in the series.

7. The clone trooper attires you see in the movies are completely created with the use of CGI as there were no physical costumes produced.

8. The late 90’s/early 00’s pop group NSYNC actually made a cameo appearance before being cut from the final edit of Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones. Why? George Lucas had to keep his daughters happy.

9. Darth Vader aka Anakin Skywalker has been portrayed by a total of 6 different actors: Hayden Christensen, Jake Lloyd, Sebastian Shaw, Bob Anderson, James Earl Jones, and David Prowse whilst Harrison Ford might never have played Hans Solo as Burt Reynolds was considered first for the role.

10. Steven Spielberg’s E.T.’s race of aliens makes a cameo appearance in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.

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In a career that spans nearly 40 years Prince has made countless headlines, but why is he hitting the headlines now? Well not so much Prince himself but rather his work, more specifically the album and movie of the same name which was loosely based on Prince’s rise to the top had between them sold over 13 million copies in the US alone and spent 24 straights weeks at number 1 as well as winning an Academy Award and grossing over $80 million (£53m), the legendary ‘Purple Rain’. The reason being is that Purple Rain the movie is set to be remade. You would be forgiven to think the movie would have received a French, Spanish, German or even Hebrew translation! Not even close.

The movie has been remade in none other than the Western African Saharan Republic of Niger. Yes that’s right, The Republic of Niger. Now you might consider that to be a bit odd or the fact that the remake is aimed at the Tuareg people of Niger who probably have no idea who Prince is, but what’s worse and even stranger is there is no direct translation for the word ‘purple’, instead of ‘Purple Rain’ the Tuareg version is ‘Akounak Tedalat Taha Tazoughai’ which translates into a rather long-winded awkward title of ‘Rain the Colour of Blue with a Little Red in It’.

For those of you thinking this must be some sort of a joke, the low budget Akounak Tedalat Taha Tazoughai or Rain the Colour of Blue with a Little Red in It has actually become quite popular in Niger as it follows real life musician Mdou Moctar’s rise to the top as he rides his purple or blue with a little bit of red bike around the city of Agadez.

But there is some truth in the idea that this remake is some sort of joke as Christopher Kirkley, the co-writer and director of the remake confirmed when speaking to The Guardian “It started out as a joke, the idea to take this cult film from the west and remake it in the Sahara. But we realised if we took the original story and modified it, the remake would reflect the lives of every guitarist in the Tuareg community.”

What are your thoughts?

A story originally reported on The Guardian.

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