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Legal foreign language translations tip 7 - Do hire a legal
translation company instead of having your legal and financial
documents translated by "universal translator",
or computer translation devices, or translation software.
Ah, the temptation of machine-generated translation. Simply
cut and paste your text, hit "translate," and walk
away with your finished legal document in less than two minutes.
But think about it. If it took months to prepare your legal
or financial papers, shouldn't you be automatically wary of
a something so fast and imprecise?
The answer is "yes," according to an article appearing
in the Wall Street Journal, and if your goal is "to translate
your company's message into another of the globe's languages,
you probably don't want to do it on the Web."
Instant translations can have humorous - yet disastrous results.
The article relates the story of a cheesecake storeowner who
received angry emails complaining about his translations.
With descriptions ranging from "frightening" cheesecake
(for chilled cheesecake), and a "chocolate-integrated
circuit" cheesecake, the owner's international reputation
was sullied.
Machine-generated translation, or "computer translation",
or "translation software," will render your legal
or financial document useless - and that far outweighs any
quick fix it provides.
Professional legal translation companies rely on human translators,
and not on mindless and mechanical processes of machine translation
or translation software devices. Only professional legal translation
companies can ensure that the message conveyed in your German
language documents- and in other foreign language documents-
sounds really germane to the English-speakers, and that every
nuance is intact. Why take chances with a "frightening"
translation?
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