Castingwords Transcribers - Questions and Answers

Discussion in 'CastingWords' started by nobody, Jul 15, 2012.

  1. Maggiemw

    Maggiemw User

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    Cool! You have every right to get excited! May it stay like that forever (or at least, until they invent 10s again...)

    I just finished a horrendously difficult one, which I should probably have returned. But once I accept a hit, I kinda feel honour-bound to see it through... Did the absolute best I could out of a major mess. It was instantly approved, though, but when a human editor sees it... [cringing]
     
    #161 Maggiemw, Aug 5, 2012
    Last edited by a moderator: Aug 5, 2012
  2. Ovningskora

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    Still at 79 PPT...

    [​IMG]





    edit: problem resolved
     
    #162 Ovningskora, Aug 5, 2012
    Last edited by a moderator: Aug 6, 2012
  3. Whimsy

    Whimsy User

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    You can write to support and ask them to review. They will (probably) give you an answer as to why you've been blocked. You have mostly 7s, an 8 and a 6. If you'd had a couple more 8s your PPT may have been bumped and the 6 wouldn't have been so harmful.

    http://support.castingwords.com/home

    That's where you'll see responses to any tickets you've started (sometimes they don't make it to email) and you can generate a support ticket there, as well.
     
  4. Ovningskora

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    It looks dim, but thank you Whimsy. I'm asking them to give me another chance.
     
  5. chuck_h

    chuck_h User

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    So, I just pulled my scores down form CastingWords.

    [​IMG]

    So, two 6's, two 7's, and two 9's. At least I was improving, not that it matters one whit. I'm blocked from doing any more work for them, since I now have a PPT of 78.:eek:

    Amusingly, I noticed they rejected a whole block of my text, which was correct, for one that was laughably wrong but formatted better. (I still got a 9.00 for that one- it was the Nick Bloom transcript.)
     
  6. Ovningskora

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    #166 Ovningskora, Aug 5, 2012
    Last edited by a moderator: Aug 6, 2012
  7. pwt

    pwt User

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    I don't think so. I had a couple of 5s last year (not my fault) and they didn't change my PPT, as best as I can remember.
     
  8. Whimsy

    Whimsy User

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    A little while back I was given a grade of 5. It was an auto-grade. I'd forgotten to accept a HIT before working on it - accepted - pasted in work - submitted. I was flagged as "cheating" because of the short amount of time the HIT was actually assigned to me, given a 5 and my PPT went down two points. It was only after finding the 5, writing to CW with questions, getting a reply that I figured out that's what led to the 5 and the drop in my score.
     
  9. chuck_h

    chuck_h User

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    I have no idea what their system is. By the time my 9's came up for grading, they were already marking my transcripts with the "This transcriber has been blocked, please pay special attention to their work" heading that they put there for editors.

    Oh, well. I'll stick with the SpeechInk transcriptions if I really need a transcribing fix. My ratings there are 96 for verbatim transcriptions, and 98 for the home inspection ones.

    I did attempt a non-verbatim one earlier for SpeechInk but I only had 8 minutes to do it and I just can't transcribe that quickly. Wound up returning it at 7:15 after getting about 75% done. I'm accurate, but I'm slow.
     
  10. Whimsy

    Whimsy User

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    Do you use anything to help with transcription? I use ExpressScribe. You can download it for free. It'll ask you to pay after a couple weeks but I just redownload till I am ready to cough up the cash. You can slow the audio down, raise/lower volume, have it Play a few seconds, pause, rewind a bit, play a few seconds...That Play with Pausing has increased my completion speed a TON. If you like transcription, it's a great tool.
     
  11. pwt

    pwt User

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    That, and Audacity for boosting the loudness for really quiet work. I transcribe in LibreOffice (formally OpenOffice) Writer, and use a crappy little desktop Java timer. I have a template for CW transcripts that narrows the page so that paragraphs look right, but are usually still under 350 characters.

    I'd have a pedal, but they just cost too damn much. I can afford one, but I'm not spending $70 for a floor mouse. Just not going to happen.
     
  12. Ovningskora

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    How do those compare? Any short and easy ones like Casting Words* has? That's what I like.

    I may very well just have to check it out myself.
     
    #172 Ovningskora, Aug 5, 2012
    Last edited by a moderator: Aug 6, 2012
  13. bootybitch

    bootybitch Banned

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    SpeechInk is the only transcription I do, too. I stick with verbatim, having to edit all the speech impediments takes me too long.
     
  14. chuck_h

    chuck_h User

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    The verbatim English ones can be kind of frustrating, because you're dealing with untrained speakers who pepper their speech with all sorts of "um"s and "uh"s and "you know"s and you have to transcribe every last one of them.

    The audio quality can be, well, "highly variable" because they're telephone recordings, and I swear to God some people must be trying actually insert their phones in their mouths while they speak.

    I also recently transcribed a gentleman who had what seemed to be both impaired speech and cognitive function, and I have speculations as to which beverage caused the impairment.

    All that being said, I prefer the verbatim transcriptions because it removes the responsibility of deciding what to leave out and replaces it with trying to make sure every last utterance is in.

    They do have some in short lengths, under 3 minutes, which I've restricted myself to because it hurts my brain trying to transcribe anything longer and because I'm ridiculously slow. I figure if I did them full-time I'd be lucky to get in a half hour of recorded speech per day.
     
  15. Ovningskora

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    ^ thanks.

    Sorry to further derail the thread, but I was e-mailed the following after requesting qualification:




    I will do this tomorrow as I am interested... I just have to let them know this in a professional matter :)
     
  16. Maggiemw

    Maggiemw User

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    Audacity is excellent for boosting loudness and for cleaning up the static produced by boosting the volume! I preview the file audio carefully before I accept the hit because there is only so much you can do to improve lousy audio.

    I boost the volume and then do a careful noise removal. Because I have no idea how to install LAME to export the result to an mp3 format, I export the file as a .wav and use Express Scribe from there on. Hope this helps!
     
  17. pwt

    pwt User

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  18. Maggiemw

    Maggiemw User

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    Thanks pwt!!! I followed your link and everything works wonderfully! Thank you once again! I owe you one (or two... :) )
     
  19. pwt

    pwt User

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    You're welcome.
     
  20. nobody

    nobody User

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    Woohoo! Congrats, Whimsy. My ears hurt that day, too.
    Thanks maggie! I'm about to try a difficult one. I've already decided that if I start to get a lot of inaudible sections, I'm returning it. I refuse to risk my auto 9s this soon. :)
     

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