Zarxrax wrote:
Sounds like you're splitting hairs. If you need it to be THAT accurate maybe it's not the dictionary for you. I don't have a problem with something like that though, as they both seem to mean pretty much the same thing to me.
Reuteirs Japan's translation said the US ok'd fishing セミクジラ, an endangered species. I don't think it'd fall into the category of "same difference." But you might have a different opinion.
魔女集会に参加してるんですけど is like a typical mistranslation you can find in a QUALITY speedsub. If you don't mind it, it's totally cool. It's just the kind of error a reliable dictionary would never ever make. You might want to be a little more careful though because it's just a coincidence the meanings of the two sentences are similar. The same kind of error can lead to a totally screwed interpretation.
Also, 本物の and 本当に are quite different in Japanese, though "for real" partly covers both meanings. Again, if you don't need to differentiate them, a decent dictionary is definitely overkill.
Edit:
welldone101 wrote:
Magamo, is the Japanese an incorrect translation? Or is it incorrect Japanese. I think most of us are more worried about incorrect Japanese than incorrect translation. Studying from enough sources would correct the second problem, but inputting bad Japanese in the first place is another.
Reuteirs Japan's mistranslation was in good grammar with a messed up meaning. I don't know if this is the kind of incorrect Japanese you think can be easily corrected.
Apparently phrases containing technical terms in 英辞郎 are not reviewed by people in the know, so sometimes example sentences/translations are simply wrong or sound as if the author doesn't know what he's talking about, though grammar is ok (I guess the authors didn't bother to consult experts). The latest version might be free of these notorious errors if they employed experts on various fields.
As for Japanese grammar in the dictionary, it's poor when compared with a real dictionary for obvious reasons; translators are not linguists. But then again, they're all written by native speakers, so you could say it's acceptable. It's just it looks as if college students wrote some entries, which is probably true.
I think it's a good resource if used as a huge bilingual text, but if the word "dictionary" has a connotation of "authority," I don't think 英辞郎 is a dictionary.
Last edited by magamo (2009 July 01, 9:47 pm)
