Translation

Google India paid local companies/agencies to test and use their Indian language translation tool. The platform they chose was Wikipedia.

What happened next was disastrous. Especially on Kannada Wikipedia.

Rumors spread that "You get paid for writing on Wikipedia". The regular  contributors felt discouraged as they continued to contribute as volunteers while others, the translators commissioned by agencies were getting paid pretty well.

Google was actually paying the agencies, translators who used their translation tool to translate articles from English Wikipedia to the Indian language projects.

Professor O L Nagabushana Swamy had translated Rilke's "Letters To A Young Poet" to Kannada. This came as a book last week, titled "ಯುವಕವಿಗೆ ಬರೆದ ಪತ್ರಗಳು" at Gandhi Sahithya Sangha, Malleshwaram. I usually stay away from public events, but this one was an exception.

Rashtrakavi G S S was there, and so were several familiar faces. I also got a chance to meet several members from Sampada community. Savitha has logged the event on Sampada, and so has Avadhi, with pictures.