Newbie - What Should I Have Done?

Discussion in 'CastingWords' started by layla19, Jul 8, 2014.

  1. layla19

    layla19 Member

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    Hey Turkers! I'm pretty new.. only been turking for 4 days. I've gotten some good HITs in and am about to reach 100 HITs. I've gotten messages from several requesters saying I did a great job with transcribing, quality checks, etc.

    I say this not to be a bragger (I swear.. I hate braggers). I say this so you'll know I do quality work before I tell you what happened.

    I did a transcribing HIT for CastingWords. It looked great, super easy.. and the $1.25 looked good to this noob. Forty-five minutes later, I had only made it through half of the h o r r i b l e 13-minute long audio clip. I listened to each little section multiple times to make sure I had it right, which was difficult (see below). I may have just been spoiled by the transcriptions I've done over the past few days, so please tell me if I have too high of expectations.

    Let me sum it up like this: there were an indeterminate amount of people in the clip. I had no idea how many people were talking. The instructions said 6. I heard at least 10 voices. It would have taken another solid hour just to go back and figure out who was who to make sure I had the speaker labels right. On top of that, half of the speakers were so far away from the mic that their voices sounded like Charlie Brown's teacher. By the time I realized how bad the clip was (it wasn't terrible in the first 5 minutes or so), I've sunk some serious time into this HIT.

    So.. 45 minutes later, I have to say I'm a bit perturbed. I thought about returning the HIT several times because I was not EVEN about to spend another hour doing the rest of the clip, then going back to figure out who was who. Then, guess what happens?

    The audio clip stops working. It won't let me rewind anymore. Anytime I try to drag the cursor back a few seconds, it goes to the beginning of the clip. I refresh the page, do everything I can think of to get it working again. No dice.

    At this point.. I'm so done. So I decide to submit what I have. In hindsight, probably not the best decision. I was just soo annoyed and had a strong desire to have at least something to show for the past 45 minutes. And I got something to show for it.. my first big, fat rejection.

    I put in the comments that I know it's incomplete and explain what happened with the audio clip. I also explain that the video was ridiculously hard to transcribe. I apologized if I did the wrong thing by submitting an incomplete transcript.

    So, all of this to say--was I completed wrong by doing this? Did you gasp out loud when you saw that I submitted an incomplete transcript? If so, I will tuck my little tail and accept my punishment.

    I would love some feedback on what I should have done so I don't commit an unforgivable sin next time. Thaanks for helping out a crazy noob :).
     
  2. Malaclypse

    Malaclypse User

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    lifes too short, just return broken hits, time spent trying to figure out that crap audio is time you could have been working on a working one that pays better because you didnt waste your time, not worth the stress or potential rejects
     
  3. goodbye_i

    goodbye_i User

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    I know it sucks, but unfortunately, you were in the wrong. I know you sunk all that time into it, but most requesters will reject a half-complete HIT. The best thing to do in that situation is just return the HIT. You will be fine though, it is just one rejection and not a block or anything. I'd stay away from those CastingWords HITs in the future, they pay pretty dreadfully.
     
  4. oldbones

    oldbones Member

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    Long time Casting Words worker here. Sorry for your bad experience. It takes a while to get started with CW and some of the audio is absolutely impossible but once you get the style down it does pay well. Don't ever turn anything in that is not complete or anything you haven't completely proofread. They are unbelievably picky these days. They're going to punish you for any infraction of the style guide and also any typos or misspellings.
     
  5. oldbones

    oldbones Member

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    One tip is to download the audio into Express Scribe. Then you can crank up the volume and do some other improvements to the audio. While you're typing you have to realize that you're not going to get anything by them. If you are unsure of anything don't listen to it over and over, mark it and go on and if that happens more than a couple times return it.

    You must read and follow the style guide. It's stupid in so many ways but I figure hey it's their company and they can be as stupid as they want to be. Resistance is futile just do what they say, to the letter.

    They have made things really difficult changing the style guide re labels. Saving grace is that you don't have to name multiple speakers. You may have to read that part over and over each time you get the multiple speakers jobs.

    Other thing to remember is that unless it is marked verbatum, it should be cleaned up. No paraphrasing, you'll get punished for that, too, but leave out false starts, ums, uhs, etc. Leave out speach tics like you know, like, etc.

    If you have more questions, I'll try to answer them.
     
  6. oldbones

    oldbones Member

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    One more thing, remember you're only there for the money. Not much satisfaction beyond that. There are "teacher's pets" on here who lead you to believe differently but I know better. Good luck.
     
  7. Xynhoir

    Xynhoir Active Member

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    Fellow noobian here (Just hit 500 HITS yesterday Woot!) I got qualified for CastingWords and have done all right on them, but they really do take too long and they are way too picky and inconsistent for the amount they pay. If your goal is to get better at transcribing I'd suggest working SpeechInk Home Inspections and Redwood to start instead - pay still sucks, but they're not as anal so I've found them less stressful to work for (because I can't afford many rejections while just starting out and I've been lucky enough to have 0 so far) while bumping up my HIT numbers and getting some transcribing practice in.

    I might go back and do CastingWords when I actually want to try bumping up my score for the better gigs, but right now I want to make the moola AND build my HIT count and CW is totally not designed for either goal.

    If you do decide to stick with CW, do as oldbones suggested and get ExpressScribe. The CW HIT interface is crap and the transcriptions are too long and complicated to do them in that environment. Also be prepared to have inconsistent graders, should you turn in a complete transcription.
     
  8. layla19

    layla19 Member

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    Thanks for the help, guys! Now I know, and I'll just eat my time if that ever happens again :)

    I've tried out Redwood.. they've been super easy to work with. I've also gotten a few other favorites by now and feel like I have a little better grasp on what people want. I'm a little annoyed with CW because I emailed them in response to the reject, and I still haven't heard from them. I probably will steer clear of them from the time being. I've had too much success with other requesters to mess around with that picky nonsense for now.

    SpeechInk seems a bit daunting! I may try to tackle that beast, soon though!

    Oldbones, good tip! I hadn't even heard of that program. It should come in handy for sure! And very true.. we're just the workhorses.

    Thanks for all the replies! :)
     
  9. oldbones

    oldbones Member

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    Not surprised.

    They never answer emails where there is a complaint about a grade, a PPT, a grader or something like that. If you're having problems with the programs or asking a question about the style or something you do usually hear from them. They often will thank you if you notify them that there is a problem with a hit.

    Often you'll notice that something changes, for example, they raise or lower a qual without any explanation.
     

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