New Year's Resolutions

I've read quite a few blogs lately reflecting on the past year and setting out goals that the authors would like to achieve in the year to come and even some blogs explaining why they're not doing that. My own goals mostly revolve around making enough of a living that I don't have to get a job that requires leaving the house. With that, and my use of this blog as a public deadline/motivational tool, in mind I thought I would jot down a few of the things that I intend to achieve in the next year. Actually, most of them I want done in the first half of the year but we'll get to that.

First, I think I need a web site. This blog is a good start and will have a place on the site but I don't think it is enough. A web site would give me more control in how things appear and would probably be more flexible than a blog such as I have now, although I'm not sure how much I would use that side of things. But I think the most important part is that a web site would appear more professional and so more trustworthy. In a previous post I touched on an airline that I chose not to fly with because their web site was poorly translated and I think this is a similar sort of thing. Appearances count, even if we wish they didn't. 

Second, business cards. I've read a lot of suggestions that freelance translators should have business cards and I agree. Even as connected to the internet as we are, there is no substitute for person-to-person interaction, but making a good impression does no good if the other party doesn't remember your contact details when they need you. Personally, I have both received work from and passed on work to people I know. Business cards are just an extension of that for people that I don't know as well.

Third, I want to go to IJET this year. But before I do, I want my web site set up so it can be printed on my business cards. I think it would be a fantastic opportunity to meet other translators, or even other people for that matter (as I've said before, I don't get out much), meet up with friends I haven't seen in a while, assuming they go, and maybe even get some work out of it, I've heard that can happen too. If what I've read and heard is anything to go by, I really missed out by not going last year and I'd like to avoid making that mistake again.

Finally, I need to comment more on other people's blogs, etc. For the slightly cynical reason that it will improve the Google ranking of my own blog, and eventual website, and because if I can encourage people to comment on my blog as well, the quality of it may improve. My posts probably won't but the blog as a whole might.

And thus wraps up the final blog post of the year. Happy Christmas everyone.

WIPO wrap-up

So, my external contract with WIPO has ended and they have decided not to renew it for next year. This is quite unfortunate because it would've been guaranteed work with a steady income. It's a bit of a blow to my self-confidence but my ego is big enough to take it.

I thought I'd write a little about working with WIPO. A lot of this will be similar to the post I wrote when I left Switzerland, but that is hardly surprising since it is the same organisation.

Overall, I enjoyed working for WIPO. The work was interesting and covered a lot of different topics. It was easy to get in touch if I had any questions. And they worked with me and kept me update when we had banking issues. They also offered considerable feedback on the work I sent them, and there was quite a lot of it.

I think the only criticism that I have is the way the feedback was presented. The feedback and corrections were presented in a spreadsheet, which made it a little difficult to place them in context. I would have preferred annotations on my work. However, I've used the programs that they used and I understand why things are done the way they are. Annotating my work would have been impractical.

What do I do next? I start looking for work more actively. I've had the occasional small job come to me while I was working for WIPO, some of which I even did, but not enough if I intend to continue eating everyday. If the universe has any sense of narrative structure, I'll learn some lesson about the importance of family or doing your best or something and then it will all be smooth sailing. Otherwise this next bit could really suck.

Write right

I think an important aspect of translation that perhaps needs to be focused on more is that translators are also writers and being able to write effectively in the target language is as important as being able to understand the source text. I know that I have encountered quite a few situations were I have struggled with a sentence, not because I didn't understand it but because I was having trouble expressing it, only to have a more experienced writer (i.e. translator) provide a succinct and smooth sentence that was exactly what I wished I had written. I've written before that a translation fails if it doesn't help the author communicate with his audience and being able to write well gives us the tools to do that. I'm not sure that this is receiving the attention that it deserves. I've seen a lot of recommendations for translators that suggest taking a course in your field of interest or attending industry conferences and even at MAJIT the emphasis was in other areas. Whereas, effective writing is a skill that can be applied in any field, regardless of speciality.

Personally, I tend to place an emphasis on target language writing ability, even though it is something I struggle with a lot and I'm not as good as I'd like to be. Whenever I am asked about translating, I am always make a point of telling people that it is important to be able to write well in your native language, which is most people's target language. I collect reference books on writing in English (I was ridiculously excited when my copy of Strunk and White arrived and recommend it to everyone), which I am almost constantly using. I even once took a class in effective writing as an elective (although, I've also taken classes in music history and astronomy, so it's probably not worth much).

I'm not in a position to be sure but I suspect that here is a big part of the difference between being a good translator and being a great translator.

Testing, testing

I was recently contacted by an agency that was interested in working with me (they contacted me through LinkedIn, but that's a story for another time, perhaps) and one of the things that was mentioned was that a free test translation would be necessary. A few of the blogs I have read tend to be against this saying that almost no other field makes this demand and we don't ask for test payments, etc. (I'd link to them but it's late and I don't remember any names off-hand).

I'm not entirely sure were I stand in this debate. When I started writing I thought that test translations might be a necessary evil, especially for beginning translators. An agency (do direct clients ask for test translations?)  is taking a chance on someone who doesn't have a lot of experience and they want to be sure that this translator is up to scratch. Otherwise, they have to find someone to fix or re-translate the document and they risk losing a job or a client. An agency may ask for a portfolio or examples of work but beginning translators are not likely to have a large portfolio other than what they may have done in their own time (I'm not saying work done on your own isn't worthwhile but it may not necessarily be appropriate) or it may be confidential (most of the work I have done recently has been for WIPO and may not be published for a number of months yet, if at all), so agencies need some other way to measure the skills of the translator. I can understand why an agency would ask for a test translation.

On the other hand, maybe agencies need to have a closer look at the credentials of prospective translators. A test translation would be inappropriate, maybe even insulting, to ask of someone who has been translating for 15 or 20 years. I have been accredited as a professional translator by NAATI in Australia. This involved translating three articles on three different topics in eight hours. Sure, the articles weren't long but the standards are high and it was in no way easy. I also need to translate an average of 10,000 words per year every three years to maintain that accreditation (although this is under review). I don't think it's too much to expect agencies to know about various accreditation systems like this and the standards involved, I would even go so far as to say it is essential. I also have a master's degree from the MAJIT program at the University of Queensland, possibly the best Japanese-English translation program in the country, so I'm led to believe, and one of the few schools that WIPO recruits from worldwide for their fellowship programme. Again, agencies, especially larger ones, should probably know a bit about various education programmes. And these are all things that are considered in other fields, fields that don't involve free tests, when one applies for a job: education, qualifications and experience. So, I can understand why some translators may not want to do test translations.

As I said, I'm not entirely sure where I stand here. I can see why an agency might feel that a test translation is necessary, especially when dealing with a translator who is just starting out, but the more I think about it, the more I wonder how necessary it is. If a prospective translator has no academic qualifications or experience to speak of, it may be a good idea, and as someone relatively new to the business I do these free tests and will probably continue to do them, but if an agency wants experienced translators, who have the luxury of turning down this kind of offer, this probably isn't the best tactic. A translator without an agency can still translate, but what can an agency without translators do?

This post has been rescheduled

I'm late. I intended to put up a post at least once every two weeks and I'm late.

In my defence, things have been a little chaotic lately. I got back from visiting S____'s family a couple of weeks ago, my dad and brother were visiting and I just moved halfway across the state (which is larger than most European countries). On top of all this, I have been working as well.

But the brilliant thing is that I have the flexibility to do this, so long as I have a computer and an internet connection. When we were visiting S____'s family, I was able to keep working when we spent two weeks at her sister's house, when we were at her parent's place and when we spent the day visiting her uncle.

Working freelance is also flexible enough that when my family was visiting and I was preparing to move, I was able to reduce the amount of work that I was doing. (A dearth of work hasn't been a problem for me, yet.)

I have, however, noticed a drawback to all this flexibility. Related to the motivation issues that I have discussed earlier, if one has all flexibility and no structure, it can be very difficult to get things done. So, despite being able to work in the middle of the night if I want, I still try to keep a relatively normal schedule.

Lend me your ears, or Oi! Listen up

I recently read an interesting article about how scientists use words differently to most people. This isn't jargon where most people don't know the words but rather a case of 'it doesn't mean what you think it means'. One of the best examples of this is the word 'theory', which shows up in the arguments of ID proponents a lot. They're thinking of the common meaning, a hypothesis or a guess, whereas in science it has a much more strictly defined meaning. According to the United States National Academy of Sciences, 'In science, the word theory refers to a comprehensive explanation of an important feature of nature supported by facts gathered over time. Theories also allow scientists to make predictions about as yet unobserved phenomena.'

So, I've been thinking about how we alter our writing for our target audience. When I first started doing my master's, I thought this was a ridiculous concept. I was going to use the words that I thought were best and I'd be damned if I was going to pander to some ignoramus with a limited vocabulary and a fear of big words. I like to think I've learnt since then and that I realise this isn't the case. Now, I realise that tailoring to your audience isn't about judging what you think the readers will understand but about trying to understand how pieces in this field are written and, quite importantly, asking 'does this mean what I think it means?'

However, tailoring to an audience is not just about word choice; style is a big factor as well. (This could probably illustrate the above point as well. Here, I mean writing in a particular manner, not writing with flair.)  My work for WIPO provides a good example. A translation must not only be accurate but they have a particular in-house style that must be adhered to. For example, the avoidance of pronouns and an insistence on a full colon before a list punctuated with semi colons, even if all my grammar books say one doesn't belong there. So, tailoring a translation to this audience means writing in a particular way, not just using particular words (although there is an element of this as well).

Of course we must product an accurate translating of what the author has originally written, but no piece of writing exists in a vacuum so we also need to consider the audience and whether or not our translation will help the author communicate with that audience. Because if it doesn't, then no matter how accurate it is, no matter how beautiful a piece of writing, no matter how much effort we put into it, if it doesn't help the author communicate with their audience, we have failed.

Chinglish is starting to really bug me

I'm currently in China visiting S____'s family (from now on I will refer to my wife as S____ because I can't keep referring to her as 'my wife' and if Edgar Allen Poe did it, then it must be cool) and there's a lot more English around than one would expect, especially since this is a city that has very few western visitors. However, it is almost universally poorly translated or unnatural. A lot of it is because the target audience doesn't care but some of it is baffling.

Most of the examples I've seen probably fall into the first category. In some cases, translation is being used as a marketing tool. For example, I've seen signs in local supermarkets and in shopping centres that were in English and Chinese. Some were just simple things like 'fruit and vegetables' but some were telling you not to parabolic off the escalators. (S____ confirmed that this meant don't throw things off the escalator) There are also examples of gratuitous English here as well. We went to a photographer to get pictures taken of our daughter and a part of the service is they print an album for with the pictures. These albums tend to have cute or sentimental phrases in Chinese written in then and some in English as well. Many of these are fine, if a little over sweet for my taste, and might include lines from a poem or a song (I saw one with Jingle Bells) , but some can also be nonsensical. (I saw one sample album with Lolita written on the front. I can see how they might have made the mistake ("It's a book about a little girl") but I still don't want it associated with my little girl.) I think these are slightly unusual in that they have been translated into English for the benefit of people who don't read English. This is English as a prestige factor or a cool factor, much like a Westerner getting kanji tattoos with no idea of what they mean but applied to businesses.

The baffling ones are weird because it's either not clear who the target is or it's not clear why they didn't do a better job. In the first case, I saw a billboard when we were visiting S____'s sister that read "The worker works honorably greatly." This was in a city where I may have been the first foreigner the locals had ever seen. It's not just weird but I can't work out who it's for. As an example of the second case, when I was booking the flights here, I had narrowed the field down to Cathay Pacific and a slightly cheaper airline that I won't name. In the end, I choose Cathay Pacific because the other airline's website was so poorly translated that I just didn't feel comfortable with them. It made them look cheap and more than a little dodgy. Our fares alone would probably have covered most of the costs of a decent translation and how many fares are they missing out on for a similar reason?

I have one final example I'm not sure what to think of. As I was passing through the airport when we arrived, I saw a lot of signs to the effect of "Welcome to civilised Fuzhou", I don't remember the details exactly but I didn't notice anything wrong with the grammar etc. What's strange is that it never occured to me that Fuzhou might not be civilised until I saw the sign. It seemed very forced and unnatural and I don't think any native English speaker would write something like this in an Australian airport, for example. I don't think they were trying to counteract an already existing perconception, so is this a case of a completely normal Chinese phrase coming off as weird in English, is this marketing aimed at locals who don't know English ("Look, our airport is so big we have signs in English"), or is it just me?

WIPO vs Home

I recently started an external contract with WIPO. This is basically the job I had in Switzerland but from home. It took a little while to get myself into a proper routine and the right frame of mind (this is my first major contract with consistent delivery of source material and deadlines) but I'm getting into the swing of things. I also needed to get used to the different working environment (I've gone from a big desk in an office with two monitors to a laptop at my sister-in-law's house, we're visiting the wife's family). Beyond this, I have noticed a couple of key differences since I started and had a minor epiphany.

The first key difference is that I no longer have access to the patents. Whilst this was not unexpected, it had a bigger impact than I thought. I think, when I was actually at WIPO, I took having access to the patents for granted and, like in most romantic comedies, I didn't realise what I had until I lost it. This hasn't proved to be a major problem, thus far, because I get a bit of extra information and I tend to do a fair bit of background research and, if I need to, I can ask questions. However, it still makes things a little more difficult than I expected.

Another difference is that I have ended up talking to myself more than I normally do. When I was at WIPO, I had other people to bounce ideas off and to test if a given sentence sounded natural or made sense. At home, I am the only native English speaker in my household and while my wife speaks fine conversational English, she's not very useful for my purposes (my daughter doesn't say very much at all, mostly she laughs at me). I'm aware that most of the time I just need to hear the sentence out loud, even if it's me saying it, so I end up talking to myself a lot.

My epiphany is hardly road to Damascus stuff so let's call it a sudden realisation. My sudden realisation is that I can do whatever I want. To elaborate, when I was working at WIPO, there was always the knowledge that I was being paid to be there so I should do something constructive. But the other day I realised that that is no longer the case. So long as I meet my deadlines, I can do anything I want. When I realised this I was feeling stuck and that I wasn't accomplishing anything and then it hit me that I could stop, so I did. This blew my mind. Today, I had a very productive morning and I thought I'd like a nap after lunch, so I took one. I probably shouldn't have but that's a whole different kettle of fish. I knew this before in an offhand way but it's only recently that it really hit me. I love my job.

Self-motivation

Image from www.despair.com

One aspect of free-lancing that I never really considered when I first decided to try it was motivation, not in the sense of 'why am I doing this?' but in the sense of 'I should really stop procrastinating and do something', and this could be a serious problem if I can't keep it under control.

I find that deadlines help. Unlike Douglas Adams, I don't like to hear them whoosh by and, if I have a deadline, getting motivated is not a problem. Unfortunately, this rarely works with self-imposed deadlines, usually only if I have found some other source of motivation.

So how do I motivate myself in the absence of a deadline? In some instances, I can self-impose a deadline simply by making said deadline known. This blog is an example of that. When I first started I decided that I would need to post a minimum of once a fortnight, more often would be better but that was the minimum. I picked this amount because it would give me plenty of time to think of things to write about if I was lacking inspiration (which, surprisingly, has not been the case thus far) and because it annoys me when I sign up to a blog and then there are no posts for weeks or even months on end. So, I decided on my arbitrary update schedule and then I told my wife and now I've told everyone who reads this. I choose the deadline, but now I have to stick to it or bad stuff happens.

But what about those things that can't be readily seen by other people? For example, I'm the only one who will know whether or not I have applied for a particular job or to work with an agency. Nobody will know if I do it now or tomorrow or next week. So, how do I motivate myself and stop procrastinating? Sometimes it helps me to focus on my own personal goals, be they short term (money for rent) or long term (enough money to buy an elephant. I don't want an elephant, I just want that much money). But what usually works best for me is if I can find something to inspire me. If I read or watch something about or by someone who is at the top of their game, a great writer, or an actor or just about anything, it inspires me to do the same. This motivates me to do things like update my resume and fill in applications and do test translations and do it now, the necessary things that aren't always the most interesting.

I suspect this post may make me come across as more than a little lazy but I think everyone has tasks that they put off in favour of more interesting ones. This is just how I deal with that problem.

As a side note, reward systems (if you work hard now, you can play later) do not work for me (I'm already playing and you have nothing else I want).

Was it worth it after all?

I arrived back in Australia earlier this week and, while I have been busy, I've done next to no work at all.

With that in mind, I thought I'd post about whether or not I thought the fellowship at WIPO was worthwhile.

In a word, yes. Professionally, I feel that I got a lot out of it. I learnt a lot about translating in general and about translating for WIPO specifically. I got some experience in translating in-house, which will help me decide if I want to go for a similar position somewhere else. I made some contacts with other translators who are at similar stages in their careers to me (actually this could probably count as a personal benefit as well). And on top of all that, it'll look good on my resume.

As for personal benefits, I got to go to Europe, which was fantastic.

(I'm going to end this post here because it has been inordinately difficult to write and one of the things I learnt was to cut my losses)

By the time you read this, I will be unemployed.

So, my tenure at WIPO is up and it's time for me to consider, what next. The obvious response being 'look for more work'.

As a continuation of the analogy I offered in my last post, I've been thinking about the type of service I'd like to offer and the type of clients I'd like to cultivate. If possible, I'd like to position myself in the bespoke end of the market. There are two primary reasons for this; one is a little idealistic and the other is slightly more practical.

The idealistic reason is that I think this is more appropriate for my personality and it is more in line with how I think a business should be run. I think that a business should be personal and care about its clients. I realise that this is not always possible, that's why this is the idealistic reason.

The practical reason is that I live in a developed nation with a reasonable economy and high standard of living (although it won't take long for our politicians to fix that). I simply can't compete on price. I would need to translate millions of words a year just to pay for food. So, I need to compete on quality and service.

I think these are the two biggest factors in considering how I want my career to progress: being able to work without going mad and being able to make a living and support my family. Although my own abilities and other factors (such as what work I can get. Beggars can't be choosers, not for long anyway) will, naturally, play a role as well.

Custom-made translations! While you wait!

I was thinking about machine translation (which seems to be a popular blog topic) and it occurred to me that having something translated is a bit like getting a suit.

You could buy one off the rack (machine translation) and maybe take it to a tailor (post-editor) to improve the fit. It'll never be perfect but if it will only be used once or it's not that important to you, this is probably sufficient.

Or, you could get one made to measure, which is usually made using a machine (CAT tools) with a pattern (100% and fuzzy matches). It'll fit pretty well and it's relatively cheap using the pattern. If you're looking to get a lot of use out of it but don't have a big budget, this is a good way to go.

Of course, there is also bespoke. It's more expensive but you get what you pay for. Every stitch (word) is a labour of love (or possibly anal retentiveness) and you get something more personal and customised to your needs. This is for when quality is more important than cost.

I'm not really sure where I'm going with this, but as analogies go, I think it's pretty good.

To write or not to write Shakespeare

I have discovered that I have no middle gear. When I first started out at WIPO, one of the things that I was, repeatedly, told was that we aren't writing Shakespeare. This isn't too say that we don't try and turn out clear and concise writing. Rather it's a recognition of the fact that sometimes you just have to accept a less than terrific phrase, sentence, etc. This can be due to some of the restrictions I mentioned in a previous post or because we don't want to be too liberal in our translation. It's just something we have to deal with.

I can't. I tried but I can't. The times that I tried it felt so much like doing half a job that I was ashamed of myself. I can do my best or I can do nothing. For me, there is no middle ground. And so, I agonise and sweat and swear over every phrase and term until I'm satisfied I can't do anymore or until I run out of time, and then I hand it in certain in the knowledge that it is absolute rubbish but that I, at least, can't do any better. I know that the likely audience probably doesn't care about this sort of thing, so long as they can understand it easily, and I have no illusions about my writing ability but I can't see any reason why I shouldn't try for Shakespeare. I mean, if you don't do your best, why do it at all?

French Language Drama

I was going to post about the pros of working in-house at WIPO but, to be honest, they're pretty much the same as working in-house anywhere else. The only real difference is I can look at the patents to resolve any questions, and translators in other fields can ask the author, so it's not that special. This left me at a bit of loss for something to write about, so I thought I'd write a little about French.

Right now, I'm in Paris (one of the pros that I'm not talking about is paid holidays) and I'm currently living and working in a francophone part of Europe, so I'm being exposed to a lot of French but I should make it clear that, aside from some hazy recollection of study that I did many years ago and what I'm picking up now, I don't speak French. However, anyone with a decent working knowledge of English can probably read a fair bit in French, well I can, and I've noticed that, seen from from an English-speaker's perspective, French is very dramatic. I'm not talking about false friends, which usually have a completely different meaning, these are words that have a similar meaning but in a different register. To elaborate, in French, one does not ask a question, one demands (demander), it is not to enough to be sorry, you must be desolate (je suis desolee), the bus doesn't stop, it is arrested (arreter), these aren't words that everyone uses, the whole world (tout le monde) uses them. There are probably a lot more out there, these are just the ones I can remember without thinking too hard, and I know there are historical reasons for this and it's partly due to the close relationship between England and France and English and French, but still, it's a little amusing, n'est-ce pas?

As a side note, comparative forms can be made by adding the word 'plus' (more) or 'le plus' for the superlative. Is it just me or is that a little too close to Newspeak?

Translation a la OMPI

I've been at WIPO for about a month and a half now and I thought I'd write a little about translating there.

The first thing is to explain what gets translated. Every application has an abstract and one or two reports on the patentability of the invention (everyone gets one but you can pay extra and get a second one) and all of these are published in English, French and the language of the application (e.g. Japanese), so everything is translated at least once. Generally, I find reports to be easier because there are guidelines for writing them that I can look at, in English and Japanese, and there is a little more flexibility in translating them. Abstracts are more interesting, I think, because they tend to be more technical but they also need to be translated a bit more literally and they have their own quirks, which I will euphemistically call challenges. (Oh my, that links really well to my next paragraph. This is almost like proper writing.)

One of the challenges that I think everyone expects in this type of work is 'patentese'. To be honest, this isn't as bad as most people think. There are two things to keep in mind: no pronouns and only living things can take the possessive. It's the combination of these two guidelines, you can break 'em if you really have to but you shouldn't need to, that results in some truly ridiculous sentences especially if the invention in question has a long name. You end up with things like "the absurdly and overly-complicatedly named doohickey and the whatsit used therein" because you can't at "used in it" and it would be ridiculous to repeat the name. And so, 'thereof' and thereby' and 'therein' and words of that ilk are kept alive despite almost never being used in the real world and patentese is born. There is one more factor to patentese, which happens to be what I think is one of the biggest challenges of what I do and is the next thing I want to rant about. (What a coincidence, it's almost as if I thought about what I wanted to write and then planned for everything to link up.)

Japanese inventors are terrible writers. (Actually this probably applies to most languages and most fields, except maybe literature and that's a pretty big maybe, but this is what I have experience with so my statement stands.) For the most part, abstracts don't seem to be written; bits and pieces are copied out of the actual patent with the vague hope that it will make sense. As far as I'm aware there are no guidelines for writing abstracts but if there were they would be along the lines of the following.

Rule #1: Full stops are for wimps, if you don't have a page-long sentence, you're doing it wrong.

Rule #2: Every sentence must have at least three (3) embedded clauses, even if it is a list of two items.

Rule #3: You only need one subject regardless of how many verbs there are, don't bother making it clear which verb it belongs to, and even that one subject is optional.

Rule #4: There is NO rule #4!

Although, in all fairness I should say that some companies submit applications that are relative pleasure to translate. Sometimes they have as many as three or even four sentences.

One of the big advantages to working at WIPO is that I can look at the patent in these situations (which is not always particularly helpful), a luxury that freelancers don't have. But, I think I'll save the advantages for another post.

Hi, my name is John and I'm a translator

I started translating socially, at parties and things. I could give it up anytime I liked. And then I found myself translating all the time. it was all I could think about. I'd translate anything, I didn't care what. I even experimented with proof-reading...

This is, in fact, the first blog I've ever written, first blog post too, so I thought I'd start with a brief self-introduction and maybe talk a little about what I hope to achieve with the blog.

I'm a Japanese to English translator, albeit one just starting out. I have a Bachelor of biomedical science and a Bachelor of languages from James Cook University in North Queensland and a Master of Arts in Japanese interpreting and translation from the University of Queensland, which I just finished at the end of last year. Right now, I am in Geneva on a 3 month fellowship at WIPO. I think I would like to get involved in patent translation. It seems interesting and challenging, and I hear the money is pretty good. So far, my experience at WIPO has proved the first two points true. I'm also interested in scientific translation. I enjoy most fields of science and I've had some training in that direction.

As for what I hope to get out of the blog, at the moment, not much. I think it's likely that I will end up as a freelancer at some point (the idea of spending all day in my PJs has a lot of appeal) and I can see how a blog and a website could help to attract clients etc. but at this stage my goal is just to begin establishing an online presence and to take part in the online community. I'm not really sure if I have anything new to contribute but it may be interesting for others, and me, to watch the progress of someone just starting out. And if it doesn't work out I'll try to make sure my career crashes and burns in the most spectacular manner possible. It'll be funny.