Changes to the UNLarium and to the UNLweb

[martins]

Dear All,

From May 1st, some important changes will be applied to the UNLarium and to the UNLweb.

1. Different mappings for the same entry will no longer be remunerated
Within each assignment, the number of UNLdots and UNLcreds, if any,
will be calculated with reference to the number of entries of the
assignment and will no longer be associated to the number of mappings.
Accordingly, the limit of 3 mappings for each entry will be removed.
We expect this to help us controlling the sometimes excessive number
of mappings that have been introduced in the system, especially in
generation dictionaries, which have been causing many issues in
lexical disambiguation during natural language processing.

2. The creation of UWs for proper names will be blocked
In order to control the number of culture-bound UW's being created,
proper names will be mapped exclusively to some generic broad
categories included in the system (\"name of person\", \"name of place\",
\"name of organisation\", \"name of product\", etc.). These UWs have been
already created and are already available for mappings. This is
expected to reduce the proliferation of concepts that are not normally
translated (although transliterated).

3. New projects will now depend on the number of active users for each language
In several languages, we have very few users, which may cause personal
biases to the data and prevent us from opening verification projects
(since a user can only verify entries created by someone else). In
order to control this, we have decided to adopt the following
requirements (in addition to the existing ones):
Projects A1 - Languages with at least 01 (one) accredited user (as it is today)
Projects A2 - Languages with at least 03 (three) accredited users
Projects B1 - Languages with at least 05 (five) accredited users
Projects B2 - Languages with at least 07 (seven) accredited users
Projects C1 - Languages with at least 09 (nine) accredited users
Projects C2 - Languages with at least 11 (eleven) accredited users
By \"accredited user\", we mean users with the corresponding
certificates (depending on the projects). It's important to notice
that many languages do already meet these requirements and that new
projects are not automatically created depending only on that.
Projects are still subject to financial provision (i.e., the UNDL
Foundation can only open projects for which we have found sufficient
financial resources).

4. Strengthening our network
We would kindly request your help to increase the number of users for
less-resourced languages, in order not only to extend the range of the
projects (as described above) but also to enlarge and strengthen the
UNL community. New users should not be viewed as potential competitors
for the same entries, but someone without whom the language will not evolve in our platform.
We would really appreciate if you could
propagate our calls for participation and help us engaging more people
in the system. We would be glad to provide you with promotion
material, if necessary, and you may contact our communication manager,
Mr. Bertrand Michels (b.michels@undlfoudation.org ), in case you have
any suggestions about mailing lists or communities where we could find
potential candidates for a given language.

5. ID verification required for new freelancers
We would also bring your attention to the fact that, since last year,
we are requiring an ID proof of new users willing to be remunerated by
their work. This has been adopted to prevent false or duplicated
profiles. Additionally, we are now requiring that the native language
of newly registered users coincide with one of the official languages
of their country of birth or residence. Users may always request
language extensions by sending us internationally acknowledged
certificates or through a skype interview, in the desired language,
with a native speaker.

6. Cleaning the database
We have been doing an intensive and rigorous cleaning of our
database, in order to eliminate duplicated and orphan entries.
This may cause a considerable decrease of your amount of UNLdots,
but it should not affect the amount to be paid in each assignment.


In case of any doubts or problems, please write to info@unlweb.net

With our best regards,

--
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Ronaldo MARTINS
Language Resources Manager
UNDL Foundation
48, route de Chancy
CH-1213 - Geneva - Switzerland
+41 22 879 8090
www.undlfoundation.org
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