About SanTranslate.com

This author has not yet filled in any details.
So far SanTranslate.com has created 313 blog entries.

The Power of Group On!

Groupon is a portmanteau derived from the words “group” and “coupon”. It is a web-based business model in which discounted gift certificates usable at local or national companies are offered for sale for a period of 24 hours.

After launching in November 2008 in Chicago, the business developed hugely and as of October 2010, Groupon had become established in more than 150 markets in North America and 100 markets in Europe, Asia and South America. It has accumulated around 50 million subscribers, more than $1 billion in venture capital and $760 million in annual revenue to become the fastest-growing web company ever. Last December it even declined a $6 billion buyout offer from Google.

The site has recently launched a mobile application available on Wap, Android, Blackberry, iPhone and Windows Mobile 7. It allows users to purchase deals on their phones and use the screen to present the coupon for use.

Worldwide, there are over 500 similar sites including over 100 in US. However, by December 2010, only one of them, LivingSocial, could be described as a serious competitor. Interestingly, according to a survey of BusinessInsider in March 2010, 72% of people that use Groupon said they subscribe to LivingSocial as well. Other notable firms operating in the same market include BuyWithMe, Plum District, Jasmere.com and Saveology.

Hunting out the best deals is truly a global activity: ComScore reports that in April 2011 Groupon received more than 1 million unique visitors (age 15+ and located at home or at work) in 12 markets across the globe. The U.S. saw the largest audience with 10.4 million visitors, followed by France with 3.6 million visitors and Brazil with 2.5 million visitors. In Asia, Japan and Taiwan made the list of the top 10 largest markets for Groupon, reaching nearly 1.6 and 1.2 million visitors respectively.

The strength of deal-of-the-day websites is that they don’t need to be localised. Any on-line business can participate in Groupon’s service around the world. What you need to do to reach a wider audience is have the terms and conditions and marketing information of your products translated into the languages of your potential customers. SanTranslate is here to help you!

By |2019-09-03T21:27:04+01:00September 30th, 2011|Blog|0 Comments

ELA (Ay-la)

The Endangered Language Alliance is a new organisation whose goal is to further the documentation, description, maintenance, and revitalisation of threatened and endangered languages, and to educate the public about the causes and consequences of language extinction.

ELA is inspired by the sound and meaning of a Yahgan word aiala /aiawala/visible; light; knowledge; wise, intelligent; to know, to learn, to understand, to be conscious, to take in the meaning”. Yahgan is an endangered language of Tierra del Fuego – the southernmost human language on Earth and famous for its complex and surprising semantics. Yahgan is one of the few languages to make it into the Guinness Book of World Records for “the most succinct word”, “mamihlapinatapai”, which means “a look shared by two people with each wishing that the other will initiate something that both desire but which neither one wants to start”.

The ELA was set up last year by a trio: poet, Bob Holman and two linguists, Juliette Blevins and Dan Kaufman. They have combined forces in the heart of New York City, reckoned to be home to speakers of around 800 languages, many of them close to extinction.

The ELA has worked in detail on 12 languages since it was created. It has codified their grammars, their pronunciations and their word-formation patterns, as well as their songs and legends. Each volunteer speaker of a language of interest is first tested with what is known as a Swadesh list. This is a set of 207 high-frequency, slow-to-change words such as parts of the body, colours and basic verbs like eat, drink, sleep and kill. Once the person has been accepted, Dr Kaufman and his colleagues start analysing the language”s phonology and its syntax. This sort of analysis is the bread and butter of linguistics.

Bob Holman is currently working on two Endangered Language Projects: the Endangered Cento, a 100-line poem with each line from a different endangered tongue, and “On the Road with Bob Holman,” a series of half-hour documentaries for LinkTV.

If you are interested in endangered languages, take a look at The Rosetta Project and the rescue of endangered languages

By |2019-09-03T21:27:04+01:00September 27th, 2011|Blog|0 Comments
Go to Top