Venting, Inc.

Herewith, the text of an email sent moments ago:

I'm attaching a small excerpt of the big document. Please note that in this table of 12 segments (which I've reformatted for my convenience in working), there are less than 50 translated words and an additional 16 words identifying merged segments and sentence fragments. Every line required merging of two or more segments to make a fragment, which required additional reference to the original document to guess what the missing part is.

Between doing entirely too much cutting and pasting and referring to the original files to find what was supposed to be in the source column, these 66 words took me nearly 30 minutes to translate, which represents a significant reduction in my productivity.

Also note that I have not (and, frankly, am not prepared to) cut-and-paste the text that's missing from the Russian original source file into the source column of the table. For one thing, were I to do so, my productivity would disappear altogether and second, it probably wouldn't be suitable for the Deja Vu software.

Apropos of which, please note that owing to all of the embedded codes, this file will be impossible to proofread and, I strongly suspect, your editors will find it impossible to edit, as well.

Olga, if you somehow got the impression that the awful segmentation and missing text is is an isolated phenomenon in the document, I regret to suggest you are mistaken. The document as presented for translation is a disaster waiting to happen. I would suggest that you find the person responsible for creating this file and have them do the job again, correctly. There is still time, I think.

The other files in the assignment pose no problem for me.

I'm sending this message from my gmail.com account because my usual mail server is currently experiencing problems. I would appreciate your directing any replies to both this account and to my usual address. Thank you.

Wouldn't you know, besides this hairball, email provider FastMail has left me high and dry once again.

Life is grand.

Cheers...

UPDATE: Whew! That was quick. FM is back.

My course is clear...

At the risk of forever alienating my client, the more I look at this abortion of a source text file, and as terrible it is to kiss off a pretty payday, I'm starting to lean strongly toward backing out of the project, either substantially or completely.

My principal question at this point is: do I wait for a reply to my previous rock or do I just go ahead and suggest they start looking for additional people to "help" share the misery load?

Cheers...

It took a while, but...

My most recent ladder game on the Magmic server has ended. It's not an immortal game, but I found it interesting how Black got into trouble so quickly, and it was a challenge to take maximum advantage of my opponent's several weak opening moves. (The problem with games like this, though, is that they contribute little or nothing toward my development as a player, but that's not really a concern.}

[Date "2007.07.05"]
[White "ALEXPGP"]
[Black "RCARBONELL"]
[Result "1-0"]

1.d4 e6 2.e4 Bb4+

{Up until this move, the game was developing along the lines of the French Defense. 2...Bb4+ is a beginner's move. It doesn't do anything useful and in fact, causes Black to waste time moving his Bishop away when White plays...}

3.c3 Ba5 4.Nf3 Nf6

{Sure, this develops the Knight, but the piece is vulnerable to the push e5, after which it has to either return to its home square or move onward, to a choice of mediocre squares.}

5.Bd3 O-O?

{Black's King side is easily attacked.}

6.e5! Ng4?

{Given the way this game turned out, the preferred alternative was 6...Nd5. On g4, the Knight can be chased with...}

7.h3 Nh6 8.Ng5!

{White now has both Bishops and a Knight breathing down Black's King side, and the pawn on h7 is feeling the heat.}

8...d5?! 9.Nxh7 Re8 10.Qh5!

{Now the Queen joins the fray. At this point, I think Black is lost.}

10...Nf5 11.Bg5! Qd7 12.Bxf5?

{The move merits a '?' because White misses a forced mate that starts with 12.Nf6+}

12... exf5 13.Nf6+!

{The mate is still on the board, and White doesn't miss it this time.}

13...gxf6 14.Bxf6

{...and, barring spite checks by the Bishop on a5 and the Rook on e8, it's mate on the next move.}

Cheers...

The death of LJ?

Looking at my friends list, it would appear there are two LiveJournals out there. There is what I think of as the bolshevik contingent (the word meaning, simply, a member of the majority, and although it came to denote a very specific majority in the last century, I try the word out from time to time to "degrease" it, as it were, but I digress...). The bolsheviks might not be happy with the occasional down time LJ experiences, but they otherwise seem happy enough campers

Then there is the menshevik contingent, which has become rather agitated of late about what it views as daft and incompetent behavior on the part of LiveJournal/SixApart management, having to do with the deletion of some number of accounts because of alleged violated the Terms of Service, and with how they were deleted, and with what's happened since (botched damage control, Brad's departure from Six Apart, etc.), and as I've only followed the brouhaha with half an ear, I'll conclude by saying the mensheviks are, as opposed to the bolsheviks, not happy campers.

One thing of interest that has emerged from the discussion is a diagram showing membership accounts and various levels of activity among those accounts.
Back in mid-2000, when I joined LiveJournal, the number of members doesn't even show on the scale. The millionth account looks like it was created in late Q1 of 2003, at which time most accounts had at least one entry in them. Membership has taken off since the end of the invite-only period, but a greater portion of new accounts now never update their accounts (as compared to those early days), and after peaking in Q1 of 2005, the "active accounts" appear to be dwindling.

Does this shrinkage herald the end of LJ?

I'm not so sure. People are still joining, to see what the site is all about, and the ratio of people who never post a thing is about the same now as when SixApart bought LJ, which is pretty good considering how many popular sites such as MySpace and Facebook have cropped up in the interim. The drop in the number of active accounts could spell trouble, but as LJer pyrop points out, "there are other aspects of LJ that ought to be analyzed before we can say, full-out, that LJ is shrinking."

One thing is for sure, it will do me no good to worry about this, or to agitate about it. I sincerely hope LJ continues on for many moons, but if a quarter century on the 'net has taught me anything, it's that nothing lasts forever in cyberspace.

Time to hit the sack.

Cheers...