Tatter What? Nanoomi Who? Looah Where?
Monday, April 5, 2010 at 9:20 PM There are a Bajillion Korean (language) blogs out there that, much to my own chagrin, I just don't have the language skills to read, save for looking at the pictures.
We have seen, in the form of people like "Minerva" that in Korea especially, bloggers, while easy targets for the authorities, do have the power to raise consciousness in the best of cases, or at least rabble rouse, such was the case a year or so ago with Mad Cow, or the ongoing fracas surrounding Anti-English Spectrum.
There is all this content out there that I sorely want to read, surround myself in and learn from but...
한국말을 없어!
There are a couple of tens of quite a few Korean (English Language) blogs out there that, much to the chagrin of Korean speakers, are inaccessible as they are written in English, save for the pictures.
We are seeing an explosion of English language blogs in Korea that are extolling the wonders of Korea, its sights and its people and its food that Koreans sorely want to read, surround themselves in and learn from these visitors from their country, but...
영어를 어렵다!
Imagine a world then where you could take content from all of these blogs, English and Korean language alike, have them translated into the respective language and keep them all in one place where Koreans and English speakers could come together read these posts and learn from each other.
Imagine.
Well imagine no more dear reader, thanks to the power of The Tubes Internet, the day when all of this is possible is about to dawn.
And it's all thanks to a growing group of English language bloggers, a company called Tatter & Media and the possibilities provided by startup Social Translation Service Looah.
Tatter & Media is best described as a blog syndication network distributing content from its partner bloggers all over the Korean Internet. It is now turning to English Language content and this will come in the form of a team blog called Nanoomi (currently in beta) of which your humble Chosun Bimbo is a contributing partner.
The third side of the triangle is Looah, a social translation service (also still in beta) where by actual human flesh and blood type people collaborate on the translation of English Stories into Korean and vice versa.
Above and beyond the advantages ''social'' translation has over machine translation (which is getting pretty good nowadays) it is this kind of thing that I believe will point us in the direction, not only of a true open web regardless of language, but also towards a semantic web, or the web that can be navigated with natural language.
So in my mind Looah fills an important role not just in the short term of translation, but also in the long term development of the web in general.
In the meantime I will be writing tech stories at Nanoomi (My recent visit to Samsung being the first dry run) but will also be branching off in a few related areas. Those of you astute enough may have seen the Nanoomi badge in the sidebar over the last wee while, once the site is out of beta you'll be able to click through. Until then, stay tuned.
For more information on tatter & Media see here.
Reader Comments (5)
See where?
Are you greeking around again?
For more information on tatter & Media see here.
no link.
I like your view of the internet of the future. I don't see any English content on the Tatter&Media website, though. Maybe I didn't look carefully enough. But, thanks anyway! Being a translator, I'm especially interested in seeing Korean blog content translated to English and vice versa.
Never mind what I said. I read your posting more carefully and noticed "still in beta". Hope to see great results!
Link fixed.