Unlike the United States, most of the world uses the metric system, but that is not the only reason why measurements may need to be converted in translation. Regional formats vary from country to country and product sizes also vary from country to country.

As mentioned in the article “Size matters in global product marketing,” IKEA in the United States encountered problems when “beds were measured in centimeters, not king, queen and twin.” The company also encountered other challenges when other products were simply too large or small.

What are standard measurements for your products in the United States? Do those measurements apply outside the U.S.?

Sometimes intent is not easy to translate. As illustrated in the example below, a completely innocent statement in one language may appear incredibly rude in another.

Years ago, in Chile, I was walking around a city on a warm day with a close American friend and colleague. As we walked up a hill, in business attire, my colleague began to perspire. A former basketball and football player, he was much larger than most Chileans and was in good shape, but inherently perspires more than most.

Upon reaching the top of the hill, a Chilean gentleman noticed us and stated the obvious, “You are sweating a lot.”

My friend shrugged, and an embarrassed but friendly smile broke on his wet face.

The gentleman then asked, “It is because you are fat, isn’t it?” The comments rolled off his lips as naturally as if he were explaining that the sky is blue or the earth is round.

My colleague quickly changed the topic away from this awkward subject and thankfully realized there was no malice or rudeness in the gentleman’s comment. Having lived in Chile for a while, he understood many topics like weight may be taboo in American culture but are completely acceptable for discussion in Chilean culture. If the comment had come from someone back in his U.S. hometown, the intent and reaction would have been completely different.

(Read more about taboo topics in the article “Taboo topics like weight are treated differently in other cultures,” by Globalization Group vice president Adam Wooten.)

If a subtle rewording does not work to convey intent, a translator may need to make more explicitly changes in cases like this. A translator may explain the intent in comments [in brackets] or a translator may need to change the wording completely to something that would convey similar intent and evoke the same reaction.

Using your QWERTY English keyboard, would you like to type Spanish characters, Japanese characters, or another language? No, this does not refer to the process of inserting special characters from a list with your mouse. This refers to changing the input language for your computer without changing the operating system. Check out these links for instructions to change input languages on the following operating systems:

• Windows 7
• Mac OS X
• Chrome OS

Sometimes cultural perception of gender relations may influence how marketing and advertising is localized for other markets. See several examples in the article “Some international ads are perceived as sexist due to different cultural norms,” by Globalization Group vice president Adam Wooten. Examples include a TV commercial that seemed harmless in U.S. culture but chauvinistic in Japan and another commercial that did not understand typical Latin American relationships between husbands and wives.

…international marketers must consider that gender relations — particularly portrayals of women – can be viewed very differently in other cultures. Understanding local attitudes will help global advertisers to avoid giving offense and attain greater success in target markets.

This type of adaptation goes beyond translation into the realm of transcreation, .

Not all mistranslations mean the difference between life and death, but some do. Some cheap translations can actually kill. See the following examples from the article, “‘Airline pulp’ and bad translations that can crash a plane,” by Globalization Group vice president Adam Wooten.

…a 2008 helicopter crash in France… was suspected to be the result of an aircraft manual mistranslation.

Aviation journalist David Cenciotti reported that the crew was signaled by a cockpit light that the blade pressure had decreased. After temporarily landing for inspection and reviewing mistranslated manuals that gave incorrect instructions to solve the problem, the eight people on board mistakenly proceeded with their flight and all died in the resulting crash.

Several years ago, a coworker approached me with an opportunity to translate a manual for an airplane manufacturer. The project was large, and she really wanted to win the client. She prepared a price quote that involved having the work performed by translators who were also pilots and who specialized in this area. Because of the specialization and extra quality assurance required, the bid was by no means the cheapest we had ever submitted, but it was indeed competitive.

The client responded by informing us they wished they could use our services because of our quality control processes and our well-qualified linguists, but they felt they must save on costs and go with our competitor who submitted a quote for half the cost. If we could match the lower rate, we would get the deal. Knowing that doing so would necessitate cutting corners and lowering quality, we warned the client that “translation for those rates would crash the airplane,” and declined the risk. Months later, the same client returned and remorsefully asked us to repair the very poor translation produced by the cheaper and less qualified linguistic team.

Source: Language Log (Click to see the full image on the Language Log at upenn.edu)

Mistranslation can cause physical or financial harm, as illustrated by many anecdotes on this blog.  However, we must admit that mistranslation will – in extremely rare instances – be perceived as a virtue by some.

For example, some U.S. restaurant patrons like to see poorly translated menus in ethnic restaurants because they then assume the food will be more authentic – not prepared by many Americans who might corrupt the cuisine. Unfortunately, some other patrons will leave the restaurant disappointed that they can not understand enough to order the right dish.

Benjamin Franklin said, “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” This is true in translation. As illustrated when a magazine ironically added Google mistranslations to an article about translation quality in bold, red print, it is easier to prevent mistranslations than it is to retract mistranslations and fully recover from them.

Preventing translation blunders is easier than recovering from them. Microsoft, for instance, has previously seen the consequences of skipping preventative measures and then spending millions to recall hundreds of thousands of blundered software copies from an offended international market. Not everyone who noticed the previous month’s big, red blunder will notice a practically invisible two-line retraction in next month’s issue. Publicizing a correction in a manner that reaches all previous readers is difficult. Just ask AVUS Performance if they think everyone who saw their misnamed “Audi RS6 White Power” car also saw the correction and explanation in their subsequent press release.

Even if you speak the language, interpreters can be an advantage in negotiations or question and answer sessions. As illustrated in the following example from the article “Downplaying linguistic ability can sometimes be to your advantage in business,” interpreters can afford you a few extra seconds, seconds that can be incredibly valuable when the stakes are high.

An incident at the 2010 Miss Universe Pageant underscored the advantages of holding back in a non-native language. When asked “what is one big mistake that you’ve made in your life and what did you do to correct it?,” Miss Philippines Maria Venus Raj raised eyebrows not only for her response’s content but also for her choice of words. Raj replied, “there is nothing major, major – I mean problem – that I’ve done in my life.”

“The problem I think is, like me before, she thinks in Tagalog,” speculated Miss Universe 1969 Gloria Diaz to ABS-CBN News in the Philippines. “So, ‘major major’ is what? Malaking malaki o bonggang bongga? The context is lost or misinterpreted abroad.”

In contrast, the winning contestant, Jimena Navarrete of Mexico, answered her questions through an interpreter even though she also speaks English. This not only gave Miss Navarrete the opportunity to shield herself from perceived missteps by conveying her answers through a professional linguist, but also gave her a few extra seconds to think about her answer before responding. Although English is the language of instruction in the Philippines, former beauty queens and fans believe that Raj and future Filipino pageant contestants would fare better using an interpreter and speaking in their native tongue.

If translation crowdsourcing is not free and it carries additional risks, why should companies fit to crowdsource actually proceed? For the answer and additional details on translation crowdsourcing, read Adam Wooten’s column, “Can Companies Obtain Free Professional Services through Crowdsourcing?”

“Free was not the point. Time was,” explains Ben Sargent about Facebook’s motivations. “Translations started appearing in days, rather than in the months it otherwise would have taken a vendor to manage, test and deliver a localized user interface of more than 100,000 words.”

Other major corporations, including Cisco and Microsoft, have also said they do not implement crowdsourcing to cut costs but for other reasons, including speed.

Additional benefits include “increased take-up of Facebook in the locale concerned, immediate access to up-to-the minute terminology,” says localization expert Ultan Ó Broin. “But also it’s a powerful user engagement strategy in its own right — yielding brand loyalty, increased usage and so on.”

“…just because someone in a company understands how to avoid the risks of producing bad translation does not mean everyone in a company does. Someone else — someone whose job description is not even supposed to include translation — may not know it is inappropriate to run your marketing collateral through a free online translator. Even the U.S. State Department, home to some of the world’s most admired teams of translators and interpreters, has suffered terrible public embarrassment when people outside its language departments have mistakenly decided to produce their own unprofessional translations.”

As further explained in the article “Irony: Magazine mistakenly adds Google mistranslation to article about translation,” this point was made very clear when an unauthorized individual in a magazine’s art department added mistranslated graphics to an article about translation quality.  Even more ironically, that article specifically warned against misusing machine translation. Caterpillar has also been the victim of a similarly “helpful” magazine art department.