Who are we?
In this day and age it is perfectly understandable that people are suspicious but this initiative is as pure as they come. There are no ads on the site, nor will there be. The hosting is being paid for by one of the members and there are no real overheads so we’re not looking for monetary contributions – no donate here button or anything like that. The campaign doesn’t link to any translation agency or in any way serve as a marketing platform. People are not required to register, they can promote the campaign in any way they like, via their own blog,–hence email harvesting is not an issue. The campaign is wholly about the message, nothing else. Success is simply raising people’s awareness. If people want to copy the content and set up their own blogs they are free to do so!
As you can imagine, this issue came up a lot during the planning for the campaign but in the end the consensus came down on not publishing a list of members. There is for and against.
Off the top of my head, some of the views raised against were:
- The focus should be the message not the members.
- If a member list were published saying Agencies A, B and C and Translators X, Y and Z are backing this initiative then there would instantly be claims that this was a commercial venture designed to drive sales at the various agencies. Translators and agencies should be free to broadcast their involvement but the campaign website should not be open to charges that it is a commercial venture.
- The stance taken by the various people involved doesn’t necessarily reflect the views of their employers.
- Some agencies were worried that since the campaign is very much against the recent trend shown by major buyers, it may have a negative impact on their business.
I don’t necessarily agree with all of them but the arguments are valid nonetheless.
Tom - Campaign Coordinator