And we're back to useful tools! In the full version of this article, you will learn how to convert a document into PDF, which allows you to protect your files such as invoices and quotes. It's quite simple actually: you just have to "save as" and choose the right filetype with the latest versions of MS Office.

If you don't have Office 2010 (or use an older version), you may want to install a virtual printer such as Cute PDF Writer, which allows you to save any type of document - from your Word and Excel docs to webpages or emails - in just a few clicks.

And if you're as tech-savvy as I am and use a tablet, you can try Office Converter for Android and iOS. It's free and fully working.

Finally, if you still don't have an online back-up solution such as Dropbox (I wrote about it here), I'll be happy to send you an invitation, and we'll both get a little more storage space. Just send an email: laurent@anothertranslator.eu.

How to Convert Files to PDF is a post by Laurent Laget from (Not Just) Another Translator

(Français) De retour… ou presque is a post by Laurent Laget from (Not Just) Another Translator

Hexalogue

The Six Commandments of ‘fair-play’ in literary translation, adopted by CEATL’s General Assembly on 14 May, 2011.

1. Licensing of rights
The licensing of rights for the use of the translation shall be limited in time to a maximum of five years. It shall be subject to the restrictions and duration of the licensed rights of the original work. Each licensed right shall be mentioned in the contract.

2. Fees
The fee for the commissioned work shall be equitable, enabling the translator to make a decent living and to produce a translation of good literary quality.

3. Payment terms
On signature of the contract, the translator shall receive an advance payment of at least one third of the fee. The remainder shall be paid on delivery of the translation at the latest.

4. Obligation to publish
The publisher shall publish the translation within the period stipulated in the contract, and no later than two years after the delivery of the manuscript.

5. Share in profit
The translator shall receive a fair share of the profits from the exploitation of his/her work, in whatsoever form it may take, starting from the first copy.

6. Translator’s name
As author of the translation, the translator shall be named wherever the original author is named.

Translation’s Hexalogue is a post by Laurent Laget from (Not Just) Another Translator

• The most significant one is maybe the language bar, moved from the right column to the top menu (I wanted to do it for a long time, but it required some CSS programming tricks),
• Still in the right menu: I replaced the "Latest Posts" widget with a "Par-ci, par-là" widget with a random selection of posts (but I still haven't found a way to change the title...). Also, the "Categories" widget is now a dropdown menu,
• I changed the text on the main page (About me) so that it's lighter and clearer,
• I also updated other pages (Portfolio, Links) to reflect the development of my activity.

I hope you like these minor evolutions. As always, have your say in the comment box below. (And tomorrow, a special post on the Translation's Hexalogue !)

Minor Changes on NJATB is a post by Laurent Laget from (Not Just) Another Translator

The traditional "Matinale de la SFT" took place last saturday. This monthly breakfast gathers a bunch of translators over a coffee and a particular question. This month, it was all about audiovisual translation.

Animated by Isabelle Audinot and Sylvestre Meininger, vice-president of the ATAA (Audiovisual Translators and Adapters Association), we learned about the differences between subtitling, dubbing and voice-over, for TV or movies, as well as the "reality of a sector in crisis". So if you were thinking about translating movies, please read carefully their website (and blog).

As we were told, this is a hard-stricken sector in France: "it's like translators are chosen by the publishers", "rates dropped by 60% in 15 years", "only 20 translators make their living from movie translation" and "workforce increases by 10% each year".

Nevertheless, I have to say I'd be pretty proud if I heard George Clooney saying the words I wrote!

Morning translation is a post by Laurent Laget from (Not Just) Another Translator

The Uniforme of Progress*  ==> *La tenue de ceux qui osent

Does it remind you of something?

Marketing ravages… is a post by Laurent Laget from (Not Just) Another Translator

Let me introduce you my dear friend Sofia. Here’s what you can on its website:

SOFIA (Societé Française des Intérêts des Authors de l’écrit) is the French society tasked with defending the interests of authors of the written word; it is a non-profit-making company for the collection and distribution of rights, administered equally by authors and publishers and exclusively concerned with the field of books.
As the only society approved by the Minister for Culture for the management of PLR arising from loans in libraries, SOFIA collects and distributes the remuneration arising from these PLR. It is also primarily responsible for the collection and distribution of that portion relating to books arising from remuneration in respect of private digital reproduction.

So what is this lending right?

Law n°2003-517 dated 18 June 2003 relating to remuneration in respect of lending from public libraries and enhanced social protection for authors, introduced an official licence for PLR payments and set up a mandatory system for collective management.[…] This law authorises the lending of books from libraries, with authors and publishers in return benefiting from a fair remuneration funded by a government contribution fixed by decree and by a levy of 6% of the pre-tax retail price of books sold to a lending library, this sum to be paid by the book seller.(Source)

Note that it also works with books translated for foreign French-speaking editors as well as for English books.

Fellow Translators, you now know what you have to do to receive money in your mailbox without even moving: Join Sofia! It will cost you once and for all €38 for your society share (or you can wait that it is deduced from your first payment).

Meet SOFIA, My New BFF is a post by Laurent Laget from (Not Just) Another Translator

I often translate sports related texts, I am thus quite interested by the lexical fields used by sports journalists, such as the war references for games that are supposedly peaceful - or even pacifist ("At the end of a fierce struggle, X defeated its arch enemy Y, who finally surrendered").

Last summer, in the newspaper L’Équipe, the linguist Claude Hagège was briefly interviewed. From "no trouble" to "Du côté de chez Swann," from culture to ignorance, he analyzes good and bad habits of sports journalists and how they copy one another without any qualms.

Claude Hagège also says he’s delighted to see the newspaper using the past simple tense: he should maybe avoid visiting the UEFA.com website, since we always use the imperfect tense in French… Anyway, here's the full article.

On the same subject, during my stay in Barcelona I found an interesting little book from Néstor Alonso Hernández: "El Lenguaje de las crónicas deportivas" (ed. Cátedra), which analyzes the grammar, the syntax and the vocabulary of sports chronicles

PS: Sorry for the silence, I have been very busy and still am. In the next posts, I will try to write about the Glagolitic alphabet I saw in Croatia, as well as two purely froggy subjects about freelance working. Please be patient

Sports Journalism: without any qualm? is a post by Laurent Laget from (Not Just) Another Translator

Paper. Right. Because this is not any war, it's a StickyNote War!

This summer, in Paris, frustrated employees locked up in their offices launched a new trend: out the coffee-ciggy break, in the "post-it war". It consists in "drawing" videogames characters on your windows using sticky notes as pixels. It all began between the Ubisoft and BNP employees. Since then, it has been taken over in other Parisians offices with more or less talent (look up if you're in a business district). It made a big buzz on the Web (L'Express, Korben, local TV news) and there's even an official site.

What about us, independent workers? We may have smaller windows, or maybe no neighbours (and certainly not the same stationery budget), but why shouldn't we have a little fun between two translations? So here's my (modest) contribution:

Space invaders!

Now it's your turn : To StickyNotes, Translators! Show us what you are capable of!

And since there is always collateral damage in a conflict, here is my war wound, pretty annoying to type on my brand new solar keyboard!

This is war! is a post by Laurent Laget from (Not Just) Another Translator

Thanks Maya!

The Translator and his Cats is a post by Laurent Laget from (Not Just) Another Translator