Quality Control in Media Translation

Study Notes

Quality is defined by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO 9000, 2015) as the degree to which the inherent characteristics of an object fulfill a set of stated or implied requirements.
Requirements include needs, expectations, and obligations, with implied requirements being common practice or customary.
Quality is relative to needs and different jobs have different quality criteria because they meet different needs.
Implied needs in translation include accuracy and successful communication of the text's message to readers.

Clients often have unrealistic expectations about translation due to a lack of understanding about the process.
Educating clients can be difficult due to lack of interest or frequent changes in the person representing the client.

Computer tools are affecting the notion of acceptable quality, potentially leading to 'higher' or 'lower' expectations.
Translators may rely too much on suggestions from memory, leading to a deskilling process.
The use of computer tools may also affect the concept of quality in the minds of revisers, prioritizing terminological consistency.

Quality control focuses on fulfilling quality requirements during the translation process.
Quality assurance provides confidence that quality requirements have been fulfilled and focuses on aspects of quality management that contribute to quality before the translation process starts.