Category Archives: internet

Englisch als Vertragssprache/Zieltexter.de

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I have mentioned the book Englisch als Vertragssprache by Triebel and Vogenauer before. I have now found a detailed description by Annika Kunstmann in German in Zieltexter.de:

Das Buch „Englisch als Vertragssprache“ von Dr. Volker Triebel und Prof. Stefan Vogenauer, erschienen 2018 im Verlag C. H. Beck, München, beschäftigt sich mit englischsprachigen Verträgen und der Erkenntnis, dass solche gerade bei Geltung deutschen Rechts zu mehr Missverständnissen, Fehlerquellen und Fallstricken führen können, als dies bei deutschen Vertragstexten der Fall ist.

There is more.

Zieltexter.de is an online publication by ADÜ Nord, following the closure of the print Infoblatt. I missed Richard Schneider’s announcement at uepo.de.

TranslationTalk: rotation curation account on Twitter

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Readers probably know about Rotation Curation on Twitter (#rocur) – accounts where the person tweeting (curator) changes every week. If not, there is more in Wikipedia at Rotation Curation.

The account is usually linked to a place, as in I am Germany, but there is now a TranslationTalk account, and this week it has been curated by Paula Arturo, an Argentinian legal translator and lawyer – website translatinglawyers.com.

There are a couple of points raised by Paula this week that I would like to take up, and that will mean blog posts – I have written a couple of replies on Twitter, but I don’t feel they lead to a multi-person discussion and then they disappear into the ether.

I find it hard to follow long topics on Twitter because I don’t log in often enough to catch up with everyone I am following. Does anyone? So even if a tweet is presented as a thread, it still alternates with non-threads where the curator has a sense of continuity but many readers may not. There is an archive of TranslationTalk tweets here. This is helpful but also illustrates how broken-up the tweets are.

Translating judgments – Project Gutenberg blocks German users

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Following a dispute on copyright between Project Gutenberg in the USA and S. Fischer Verlag – German copyright still covers some works by Thomas Mann, Heinrich Mann and Alfred Döblin, but they are in the public domain in the USA – the Frankfurt am Main Regional Court (Landgericht) has ordered Project Gutenberg to block access to 18 texts to users in Germany, following which Project Gutenberg has blocked all access to Project Gutenberg in Germany, as Chris Meadows on TeleRead reports:

Project Gutenberg blocks German users after court rules in favor of Holtzbrinck subsidiary

Here’s a better summary than mine: Court Order to block access in Germany.

This case has been going on for a while and there will presumably be an appeal.

Incidentally, there is a German Projekt Gutenberg, run by Spiegel Online, which is not involved here and which I am sure complies with German copyright law.

At all events, the articles quoted give links to the original judgment and the English translation. I don’t think we often see such a good chance to comment on translating judgments (I’ve done much more translating of decisions than of contracts over the years) so in a separate post I will comment on the translation.

Misdirected emails

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I use a Gmail address with my name, margaret dot marks, but not followed by the usual number like 261 or 53, because seemingly I am the first of the many Margaret Markses to get a Gmail address. And so I often receive email not meant for me. I usually get invited to some kind of children’s parties in the USA, but sometimes it is a report from Australia.

My latest one came from another MM but contained little information or evidence. It just said ‘Tom’s new clock’ with this image, which I’m fond of. I hope it doesn’t give too much away.

‘Bonkers’ German law firm site

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Roll on Friday has named Streck Mack Schwedhelm as the bonkers law firm of the day

Before putting pen to paper, get to know the recipients better. Each lawyer is allotted a space in which to recall “My path to Streck Mack Schwedhelm”. One partner reveals, “Excel is my passion“, but instead of therapy, “I looked for a law firm in which I could exercise this passion“. She found spreadsheet heaven at Streck Mack Schwedhelm. Another declares that the firm embodies “Enthusiasm/fantasy/commitment”, and in such a crucible is it any wonder that “tax law for me came to have a thrilling legal aura which didn’t let me go“.

The site is in German too.

As they’re tax lawyers, their logo is based on the tithe.

I can understand German lawyers wanting to jazz up their websites. The culture in which they are seen is rather formal. I have translated four different ones and the desire was always to keep the English formal too. After all, the website isn’t directed to a UK or US readership.

The photos are rather fascinating here. I can see what the photographer was trying to do. He often has blurred movement in the background instead of normal bokeh, the lawyers are painfully in focus and heavy shadows show how much lighting was used (a bit like Dougie Wallace shots).