Globalization Blog

Webinar Recording Available: Translation-oriented Authoring

2008-04-24T19:37:10Z

Our April 16th webinar on translation-oriented authoring hosted by across Systems was an excellent 360 degree view of its value from a consultancy, language service provider, and end-user perspective. Thanks to Richard Sikes from LocFlowTech, Inc., Peter Argondizzo from Argo Translation, Inc., and Amy Karls from QuadTech for and a job well done! Access the recording here. As Sikes noted in his opening remarks, decisions that get made in one part of an organization often show up as costs in another area. This is particularly true of translation and localization costs. Those who create and translate product content (user guides, operator manuals, quick start guides, online help, and the list goes on...) understand the downstream effect of decisions made under pressure all too well. According to Karls, demand for multilingual product support content consistently is increasing, but timelines and resources are most assuredly not. Isolated story? We think not. Check out the webinar poll on the number of language outputs required from our audience, largely technical documentation folks. Now check out the range of tools our audience is using to create product support content. I believe there is not a single technical writer who intends to create inconsistencies or confusion for their translator counterparts. But stuff happens. Like "hurry up" pressure. Like "we lost our editor" pressure. Like "who's got the latest version of the Style Guide pressure." According to Argondizzo, translation-oriented authoring has numerous advantages, among them:

Unlocks never before utilized value of translation memory database for writers
Strengthens partnership with language service provider and writers
Provides content creators with a different perspective of translation memory usage
Easy to understand and track savings
Time saved by author not rewriting text
Consistency for additional reuse in other channels
Regulatory concerns in rewriting text that already exists

I wholeheartedly agree. Check out the webinar recording. The advantages of "assistance" is demonstrable and impressive, whether one calls it authoring assistance, translation-oriented authoring, or controlled authoring.

Multilingual Social Computing: Questioning the Wisdom of the Crowds

2008-04-23T14:03:09Z

The holy grail in translation is the speed versus quality dilemma. That creates controversy. Here's what we've noted after posting our Multilingual Social Networking Alert citing Facebook's crowdsourcing effort:

No doubt that these references are the tip of an iceberg. How to say "poke" in different languages is clearly not the only conversation going on. And BTW, here's Facebook's Translation Application.

Resources & Opportunity: W3C's ITS Interest Group

2008-04-18T17:01:59Z

At the end of March, the W3C announced the launch of the Internationalization Tag Set (ITS) Interest Group (IG) as a forum to foster a community of users that promotes the tag set's adoption and further development. Like Unicode's CLDR initiative, the emphasis on community interaction and collaboration underscores the ever-increasing, Web-driven impact of cooperative spirit. As the Web nears its 20th birthday, we would imagine efforts such as ITS IG continue to be music to the ears of its inventor and W3C founder, Tim Berners-Lee. This particular interest group is certainly not the first nor the last of the educational and outreach efforts the W3C has launched since 1994. It is also not the first nor the last of the activities from W3C's Internationalization (I18n) Activity, known worldwide as simply I18n. The mission? "To ensure that W3C's formats and protocols are usable worldwide in all languages and in all writing systems." The goals? Ensure universal access, support the internationalization and localization of documents, and help reduce the time and cost associated with internationalization and localization projects. Consistent and admirable objectives, described eloquently by Richard Ishida, Activity Lead for the I18n Core Working Group in his article, It's All About Customer Focus. I18n accomplishments include a treasure trove of information from specifications and recommendations to educational materials to the newest initiative, hosting the Planet I18n Blog aggregator. Worth checking out; give yourself time to stay a while.

Free Globalization Intelligence: Unicode's CLDR Project

2008-04-14T00:15:29Z

I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Arle Lommel, LISA OSCAR Standards Chair, to discuss the importance of Unicode's Common Locale Data Repository (CLDR) project, which collects and provides data such as date/time formats, numeric formatting, translated language and country names, and time zone information that is needed to support globalization. LC: What is the CLDR? AL: The Common Locale Data Repository is a volunteer-developed and maintained resource coordinated and administered by the Unicode Consortium that is available for free. Its goal is to gather basic linguistic information for various "locales," essentially combinations of a language and a location, like French in Switzerland. LC: What does the resource encompass? AL: CLDR gathers things like lists of language and country names, date formats, time zone names, and so forth. This is critical knowledge to know when developing projects for the markets represented by specific locales. By drilling down past the language level to look at the market level, CLDR data is designed to be relevant for a specific area of the world. Think of the difference between U.S. and British English, for example. You would clearly have a problem if British spellings were used in a U.S. project or prices appeared like "£10.54" instead of "$10.54." Problems like these are very common when product developers don't think through what the implications of their design decisions will be. LC: What other issues does CLDR address? AL: Other problems addressed by CLDR include the numeric form of dates, where something like "04.05.06" could mean "April 5, 2006," "May 4, 2006," or even "May 6, 2004," depending on where you live. Clearly you have to know what people expect. LC: What is the advantage of using CLDR? AL: It makes resources available to anyone, at no cost. Without something like the CLDR, one would need to investigate all of market issues, pay to translate things like country names into each language, and so forth. Activities such as this can add significantly to the cost of a project. The CLDR provides them for free and provides the critical advantage of consistency. LC: Why should content creators care about the CLDR? AL: At LISA we have heard time and again that not taking international issues into consideration from a project's earliest phases doubles the cost of a project and makes it take twice as long. While many issues relate to decisions made by programmers, some of the issues do relate to the job of technical authors and other content creators. While it's unlikely that a technical writer will need to use a CLDR list of language names in Finnish directly, for instance, the content creator might design an online form in which a user fills out what language he or she would like to be contacted in. If there is insufficient room to display the language name because it is longer in Finnish (a common problem when going from English to Finnish), the end user may have difficulty, something that could have been prevented by the content author if he or she had been given the resources to test the design early on. The CLDR makes the information available that allows authors to prevent basic problems that create issues for users around the world. LC: How can professionals contribute to the CLDR? AL: Right now the biggest need of the CLDR is for native (or very good) speakers of non-English languages to (1) supply missing data, and (2) verify that existing data points are correct. Because the CLDR is volunteer driven, people of all levels of competence and ability are able to contribute as much or as little as they want. Unicode welcomes this participation. The real need is for people to know about and use the CLDR. In my experience even the savviest of developers often don't know about the CLDR and what it contains, so they spend time and money on recreating a resource that they could have for free. LC: How is LISA supporting CLDR? AL: We are committed to supporting Unicode and the CLDR, so we have launched an initiative where people who sign up with LISA to contribute to the CLDR and who spend ten or more hours working on the project are eligible to receive individual LISA membership for a year as a token of our appreciation for their contribution. So if any readers have the needed language/locale skills to supply data missing from the CLDR or to review existing data, they can contact me to get started.

UN Bans Unnecessary Languages: Scary but False

2008-04-03T13:29:18Z

April Fool's Day usually brings out the kid in all of us, making for some fun and interesting spoofs. The April 1st press release that the United Nations was banning all "unnecessary languages" brought out the worried adult in me pretty quickly. Turns out I was spoofed -- thankfully. OTOH, the arrogance inherent to "all will be English" begs the question, are many organizations being spoofed on a daily basis by succumbing to this theory? And is it not scarily interesting that reading the entire article as a source of truth doesn't sound too far off given the lack of global content -- not only translated, but localized -- in numerous industries? PRWeb claimed the article "too close for comfort," but valuable for revealing serious issues in the global community. Posted by EnglishClub.com, the article stated, "By 2049, when all languages other than English will have been phased out, the only language that will have international sanction will be English." Pretty ominous sounding stuff. Enough to generate 315 extremely emotional responses to the blog entry between March 31 and April 3rd. Scary but false. As the United Nations continues to promote 2008 as the Year of International Languages, here's a "scary but true."

On Global Brand Management: An Interview with Translation.com's Candy Moss

2008-03-31T21:41:59Z

I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Candy Moss, Creative Director with Translations.com, to discuss the importance of multilingual brand management as a success criterion for global organizations. LC: What role does a creative team play within Translations.com? CM: Our Creative Team operates as a resource to our corporate clients' marketing and advertising teams. Our Multicultural Marketing Department provides cross-cultural branding research, copy transcreation, and image consulting services as part of Translations.com's core service offering. LC: What is your background? CM: 20 years in multicultural marketing consulting, with a background in content and creative design; my experience at Translations.com has increased my expertise in Hispanic markets in the U.S. as well as global markets considerably. LC: How large is the Creative Team and what kinds of tasks are they involved with? CM: We have close to 20 full time staff across multiple, global production centers. We also contract copy writers, graphic designers, and linguists. Our tasks include researching the impact of brand names, package design, website layout and content; any elements that impact of the global products nuances such as tone, style, design, content, format, color and illustrations. LC: So that means your team does both transadaptation and transcreation work, correct? For global branding projects, which skill set is needed most? CM: Both are important. However, adapting marketing messages has more to do preserving the concept (of the message) and changing the execution than with word for word translations. The example on "The Lighter Side" of our Web site demonstrates the challenge of dealing with the intricacies of culture. LC: What kinds of research does the creative team rely on? CM: We have extensive qualitative data based on 10 years of proprietary research. We develop customized survey tools based on each client's needs. Once we get feedback from the target market, we work closely with the client's creative team. This is also essential because they are the subject matter experts in their company's product, positioning goals, and target customers. Generally, we function as an extension of a company's brand champion team: the advertising agency is, in my experience, the group that is the first to recognize the need for our services. In the end, we team up with the agency and the company's internal staff, serving as a general resource to the group. LC: What are some of the best practices you have seen in global branding efforts? CM: Understanding the need for due diligence in obtaining, understanding, and incorporating the voice of the local customer. And then, having the skills to distinguish between individual opinions and reactions to those of the larger culture. Overall? Understand your goals: why are you making these localization efforts and how effectively do they convey your company's goals. LC: And the worst? CM: The idea that one person can assume what a culture will or will not bear. You really have to be open minded so that you are receptive to what impact a phrase or image will have in each cultural setting. A single line of copy or image can have a lasting impact -- you want to do everything you can to be sure that impact is positive. Even after 20 years in the industry, and evaluating more survey responses than I can count, I learn something new every day. LC: What is your advice for those striving to communicate the importance of the local in globalization? CM: Ask your team to put themselves in the target market's shoes. If that market receives only x percentage of localized content, the perception may be that they are only as important as the effort put into communicating with them. In terms of marketing and global branding efforts, think of the effort put into the taglines or slogans in the source language, usually English. When adapting the message to a different culture, give the effort the same level of respect.

Who's got the latest version of the Style Guide?

2008-03-24T14:40:19Z

I distinctly remember asking this question to my peers (and to myself!) at various companies throughout my technical writing career. Lots of times I got the same question as the answer. And most times, the "who's go it" discussion occurred in the midst of a post-mortem point release meeting or as a result of a technical support inquiry based on conflicting documentation narrative or procedures. I worked with an exceptional group of writers during the late 80's through the mid-90's. We were dedicated to accuracy, consistency, reusability, and making sure that Engineering and Quality Assurance never forgot where we sat. We were pioneers at the time in achieving single-sourced print, electronic, and online help documentation without the benefits of mature commercial tools. When managing the translation of documentation products, we spent lots and lots of time on the phone. We were stressed. Highly stressed. For all our good intentions, a paper-based Style Guide complete with change pages and various scribbles in the margins to document new decisions didn't cut it. Rigorously-developed templates and in turn DTDs, did not deliver the foul-proof uniformity insurance we imagined. After all, we were creative and passionate writers! Bound by common goals for quality, but invigorated by the chance to innovatively describe complex and technical subjects in new and interesting ways ;-). Unfortunately for our translator-counterparts, there were times it just didn't compute. I've shown my age by reminiscing as a "that was then, this is now" exercise. Content creation and in particular, managing team-authored product support content has come a long way. Social computing technologies will undoubtedly take it even farther. What I'm most impressed with now, is the availability and value of authoring assistance (as opposed to absolute control) that brings a living, breathing corporate Style Guide into the technical writing and translation environments without disrupting creative flow or requiring re-training. Join me on April 9th to discuss the value of authoring assistance with technology provider across Systems, language services provider Argo Translation, Inc., and Quad/Graphics, a customer reaping the benefits of authoring assistance technology in a FrameMaker environment. Register here. Submit questions here.

Globalization is Hoppin'

2008-03-16T18:04:14Z

Just a quick observation about the March 11 edition of Gilbane's email news round-up. Five of the ten "news-of-note" summaries were developments in the globalization space that we cover in this blog.

Across Systems formally establishes presence in North America.
Translations.com merges with Alchemy.
Clay Tablet partners with Oracle.
Sajan releases new search-and-match technology for multilingual content.
MultiCorpora offers packaged solutions for corporate translation applications.

More evidence that there's lots shaking in the world of people, process, and technology for multilingual business communications.

Multilingual Social Networking Alert!

2008-03-14T15:43:38Z

The World's Top Social Networking Sites according to Foreign Policy magazine. Included on the list? Facebook, with over 60 percent of its users outside of the U.S. The company is intent on chasing MySpace in the multilingual arena with broad plans to expand its global presence in a very local way. First up? Spanish, launched in February and completed in less than four weeks utilizing nearly 1,500 Spanish-speaking users. Crowdsourcing with community-driven voting enabled approval of translations in record time. Next? German, released barely a month later based on the same model, but with input from over 2000 German-speaking users, the site was up and running in 1/2 the time. TechCrunch is a great site to get the background on the effort as well as the application Facebook provided to get the job done. The third? French, but launch unknown as of today.

The Local Part of Globalization: Social Computing's Role

2008-03-11T20:49:52Z

One of the blogs I read regularly is penned by Irving Wladawsky-Berger, Chairman Emeritus from the IBM Academy of Technology. A 37-year IBM veteran (and recent retiree as of May, 2007) Wladawsky-Berger writes on innovation, corporate culture, knowledge management, and as you would expect, technology. Usually thought-provoking, I've been re-visiting a particular entry while observing "the winds of change" in the content and translation management software industries. (Just about) All Innovation is Local In this entry, Wladawsky-Berger writes, "While it is easy to focus on the global, universal aspects of the successful innovation hubs - great technologists, entrepreneurs and venture capitalists - they miss the very local, human elements that make it all work." Words close to my pet peeve, the significance of the triad of people, process, and technology in global content management strategies. IMO, it is no mistake that this age-old expression lists people first, technology last, and process as element that ties the two together. Truly localized content, more than just red = rojo, is impossible to produce without cooperation, collective responsibility, and the premise that "differences still matter" and perhaps the world isn't so flat after all. (Wladawsky-Berger's entry spurred me to purchase Pankaj Ghemawat's book, Redefining Global Strategy, published this past September.) When globalization is an incidental black box in the process model with planning and execution relegated to the final stage of product support or web content delivery, the local part of globalization disappears. Granted, even the power of the Internet does not erase the fact that merging collective, culturally-aware, and local expertise is hard. But hey, collaboration has always been hard, simply because it's not about technology, it's about motivation, feedback, a sense of responsibility, a feeling of community -- you know, all those human complexities. We believe social computing has the energy to encourage and enable innovative collaboration in global content management, but even these applications will face the user adoption test: usability and relevancy to the task at hand. We're off to find some of the most intriguing examples of success. Got one? Comment here and stay tuned.

Globalization Sessions at Gilbane San Francisco

2008-03-08T21:26:06Z

Our conference in San Francisco from June 18-20 extends our discussion of global content to the West Coast. We'll be talking about the ability to create, define and manage a Global Content Value Chain within two distinct operational areas: customer service and brand management, both highly dependent on accurate, consistent, and contextual multilingual communications. We'll also provide content professionals with a succinct knowledge map of translation process and technology components, increasingly handy as the content and translation management worlds collide. Then, onto an update on system integration opportunities based on enterprise strategy rather than ad-hoc processes. Join us! Globalization Track Lineup: (full grid is here) GCM-1: Optimizing the Global Content Value Chain: Focus on Product Support Content Wednesday, June 18: 2:00 - 3:30pm Product support content includes technical documentation as well as the content that lives with a product or service in many formats and contexts, including pre-sales, post-sales, aftermarket, training, and service. The global economy adds languages as yet another output to the traditional multichannel formula, increasing content volume due to the nuances of dialect and culture. Speakers explain how to build global content value chains that combine core content technologies with heavy doses of authoring assistance, collaboration, automated workflows and project management to documentation and translation processes. Results include multilingual product content that satisfies customers, enables simultaneous shipment of products worldwide, and delivers cost and operational efficiencies. GCM-2: Optimizing the Global Content Value Chain: Focus on Web Content Thursday, June 19: 8:30 - 10:00am Customer-facing Web content must consistently communicate an organization's core brand regardless of the language through which the message is delivered. The integral role of company Web sites in engaging with customers worldwide means that effective management of multilingual Web content must be central to content and IT strategies. Effectively managing this content presents specialized considerations such as understanding the benefits of machine translation, integration with analytics and search engine optimization tools, and segment-based translation that keeps multiple Web sites in multiple languages in synch with customer expectations. Speakers explain how to build global content value chains that combine brand management techniques with web content creation, management and distribution processes. The result is multilingual Web content that ensures the best brand experience in any language, at any time. GCM-3: Case Studies in Translation and Localization: Process and Technology Overview for Content Managers Thursday, June 19: 11 - 12pm The worlds of language professionals, content managers, program and product managers, and IT are colliding, driven by the growing demand for integrating content management, translation process management, and other processes and practices comprising the global content value chain. The collision can be managed more effectively if all participants understand what's in the toolboxes of the other groups and how to put them to good use in the context of a total solution. In a case study format, language professionals explain their tools of the trade and show you how they add value to multilingual content. A session in partnership with Multilingual Magazine and Localization World. GCM-4 & WCM-6: Case Studies in Integration: WCM & GM Thursday, June 19: 3:30- 5pm Content and translation management are core processes in the global content value chain. Integrating the systems that handle them is essential to streamlining processes, increasing the volume of language translations, controlling costs, improving efficiencies and ensuring customer satisfaction. To make the most of investment in people, process, and technology, integration of WCM and GM requires an enterprise strategy, not ad hoc processes that are recreated each time a new website is launched. This session uses real-world scenarios to walk you through different approaches to integration so that you can make an informed decision about strategies and practices that are right for your organization.

The SDL/Idiom Impact: "Huge" or "Blip"?

2008-02-26T18:51:25Z

As the initial dust settles on the announcement of SDL's acquisition of Idiom, we noticed a couple of interesting trends -- some anticipated, some surprising, and some just plain troubling. Expected trends? A steady outcry from the translation community, bemoaning the loss of the "Switzerland" of translation technology. A logical assessment, given that Idiom built an enviable brand as a pure technology provider and posed no threat to neither Language Service Providers (LSP) nor ECM players. OTOH, the neutrality factor left the status quo in place, leaving room for translation and content management players to handle integration needs as partnerships and in some cases, fairly loose integrations. Also expected? Fear-driven reactions inevitable to consolidation in any software segment, summed up by the "what now" debate. Our take? Consolidation happens. The ECM market has demonstrated it for over 10 years -- the Search and BPMS market are well on their way. The platform players, i.e., the Microsoft, Oracle and IBM's of the world, have eaten more than their share, by some analyst accounts. So, consolidation happens. It is not really "what now?" that's the most important question; rather it is "what's next?" Consolidation is not always positive; it's disruptive, no doubt about it. In addition, technology mergers and acquisitions are notorious for the length of time they take to strategically integrate what's purchased. Some never do. Others have a plan from the get-go. However, there's room for upstream opportunity and technology metamorphosis within disruption, both of which the translation industry is in need of. By all accounts, this industry is overdue for major change, requiring innovation from technology, service providers, pricing, and from our perspective, "the corporate champions," currently struggling to raise the visibility of globalization as an enterprise priority. We're not ready to predict that this acquisition will bring positive changes to any of these elements. That's for the new product roadmap to lay out -- and our advice to SDL/Idiom would be to tackle this sooner rather than later. At the end of the day however, our take hardly matters. Whose does? Well, THE BUYER, silly. In terms of translation as part of the global content value chain, the documentation world is ripe and I dare say ready, for innovation based on solid knowledge of single sourcing and multichannel strategies. Add the ferocious uptake of DITA over the past 2 years, and you have a situation where a language can be an output rather than an overdue afterthought. Over on the "other side of the house," marketing is still trying to prove the value of geographically-targeted web sites as critical to brand and new revenue. Though these audiences may currently search for different solutions to their problems, they are today's buyers of translation and localization technologies. Surprising trends? A lack of concern about tomorrow's buyer. You know, the corporate champions who already view globalization as an enterprise mandate, but can't justify an enterprise cost yet. The technology industry would be wise to "get ready," so to speak and by some accounts, they are. According to the BDO Seidman 2008 Technology Outlook Survey, 73% of CFOs at leading U.S. technology businesses expect to post increased sales revenue in 2008 over 2007. Over 39% cited consumer demand for innovative personal technology as the greatest growth driver, closely followed by 32% who cited international expansion as the main driver. Promising, yes. But what about the corporate CIO's? Many corporate champions we talk to still describe cultures that perceive translation and localization as the "black box" at the end of a larger process. Troubling trends? The lack of response from the large US-based ECM vendors. It would not have been surprising for us -- and we dare say more "savvy" than surprising -- to see an ECM or WCM best-of-breed pick up Idiom. Perhaps SDL understands that value, in light of the Tridion acquisition as well as the Trisoft investment. We've been on the integration bandwagon for some time; there's opportunity to squelch the ad-hoc, siloed approaches to content and translation management as the norm. Trouble is, the "conversation" has yet to rise to a level where a departmental challenge transforms to an enterprise initiative. Consolidation happens. It doesn't mean the end of a market, but its reshaping. From our perspective, the time is right for vendors and users alike to collaboratively define the transformation.

A Sharp Stick in the Eye: Tying $$ to Multilingual Content

2008-02-20T12:52:01Z

Hewlett-Packard has long been a poster child for the application of people, process, and technology to content globalization solutions. The Gilbane case study on HP documented the company's commitment to satisfying customers in their local langauges. The mandate for multilingual content was made clear by the then-VP of content and product data management: 90% of HP's customers buy based on content, not on touching the product. The importance of investment in content globalization solutions was driven home once again with HP's announcement of quarterly earnings on Feb 19. Overall, the company posted a 38% increase in earnings and a 13% rise in revenue for its fiscal first quarter. Of note to our readers:

In its first quarter, H-P's results were fueled by strong sales in its personal-computer division and robust sales overseas, particularly in markets such as Brazil, Russia, India and China. International markets accounted for 69% of H-P's revenue for the quarter.

Put these results together with customer buying patterns.

69% of the company's revenues were in markets outside the US.
90% of customers buy based content, not on touching the product.

Can there be any more compelling reason to develop a multilingual content strategy? And invest in people, process, and technology to execute against it?

Multilingual Social Media

2008-02-14T13:44:04Z

I keep being fascinated about the role of language in social media. I read a very interesting article on multilingual social bookmarking in the Just Landed web site. English is extremely dominant in social bookmarking, although a lot of the English sites also contain bookmarks to non-English sites. Among the non-English sites, German dominates. I also noticed that there are multilingual Indian social bookmarking sites which include several Indian languages. Is social media actually compartmentalized by languages? Christian Kreutz has an excellent entry in his blog about the multilingual social web. As he says: "So it is a dilemma. On one way English allows us to communicate worldwide, but at the same time it narrows down the potential for collaboration by simply contradicting cultural diversity." I would guess that more social and customer-generated media will eventually mean more machine translation, because it would be nice to share thoughts over the language barrier. Or I might be quite wrong, and most of the discussions and social sites will actually be quite local, shared by people who already share a language. Language is, after all, more than words: it is also culture and connotations and nuances, some of which are impossible to translate. It would be interesting to hear from the MT community: do you see increased demand from social media sites?

SDL Buys Idiom: Not an "I", now an "A"

2008-02-11T16:31:49Z

Integration versus Acquisition, that is. Certainly the latter does not preclude the former. And we expect that it will most certainly not. SDL and Idiom are making a strategic industry announcement with this move, with both obvious and subtle impacts on both the translation and content management industries. Most obvious is the influence it can have on the impact of integrating workflows, a year-long discussion we've having with the Gilbane community. Bringing more visibility to the Global Content Lifecycle and hopefully, more conversation on adding value throughout is a positive event. Ramifications on the state of content management interoperability, LSP neutrality, and market uptake for Idiom's deep investment in the SaaS approach will be more subtle impacts, which will be important for our community to understand. We'll keep you posted as always, but note today's facts:

This is not SDL's first foray into merging the translation and content management technologies, demonstrated by May's Tridion acquisition and the more recent investment in Trisoft, strengthening an already "deep" partnership albeit with no public announcement. Tridion caught the attention of marketing content management professionals; Trisoft should have caught the attention of techcomm content management professionals. Idiom will capture the attention of both.
As we discussed in Gilbane Boston 2007, organizations that understand the impact of multilingual communications on efficiency, brand, and revenue are moving globalization strategies upstream to "bake in" quality at source content creation. One of my favorite quotes during our Quality at the Source session was from Richard Sikes from the Localization Institute, who reminded our audience that "the whip cracks loudest at the farthest end."
The acquisition announcement will trigger more conversation on topics included in our 2008 Globalization Wish List, in particular the idea of "closing the gap."

See our post on the main Gilbane analyst blog. And stay tuned.