Very bad manual translations

[Tapewolf]

Just had a visit from my family.  My father brought around the manual for his 'MP4 player', which he purchased on ebay.  It is probably one of the most hysterical pieces of writing I've ever seen.
The company who made it is anonymous (wise, since the device is a total ipod ripoff, even down to a sort of apple logo in each page corner), so we cannot obtain a PDF copy.  I'll have to ask if there was one on the device driver CD because it would save a lot of time.

He's going to scan it in for me at some point, but until then (or in case we both forget) here is a sample.  Two passages I managed to scrawl down before they left, and a couple of notes.  Again, this is just a sample - the entire 24-page booklet is filled with this stuff.

4.2 - Broadcast the interface function elucidation

* The knife man - impulsive punishment : broadcast the level is smooth to roll over

There's also a line which starts with "Get or give an electric shock," - this is actually an instruction, not part of the safety warnings.

Amongst other things it uses the term 'vegetables' while referring to part of the device, the word 'dish' seems to mean 'menu item' in certain circumstances and it continually uses the word 'manhunt' instead of 'search' while describing what we think is the automatic FM tuning.  (We cannot be certain of that though.)  'Elucidation' is used constantly throughout the document and we think it probably means 'explanation' or 'reference'.

I hope to obtain some scans fairly soon.  Does anyone else have some good examples of bad manual translations?

**EDIT**
Oh, and 'trumpet' turns up a lot.  We don't know if it means 'microphone' or 'loudspeaker', though...

[superluser]

Heh.  Thank you for reminding me.  I've got a bad manual, but it's not translated.  Someone gave it to me under the condition that I do something with it:



Remember--if you can't give mouth-to-mouth, give the guy a backrub.  It won't help, but neither will anything else in this book. 

Thank you, Civil Defense Department!  Good thing we got rid of it and got FEMA and Homeland Security instead!

[bill]

I miss those old CD helmets, though. Had such a cool logo.

[Tapewolf]

Hallelujah!

By the power of Google, I have found it.  It seems the phrase "The knife man - impulsive punishment" has become a meme, and I quite agree.

This is 33MB, but absolutely worth it.  It appears to have been scanned in by someone else, so short of OCR, it's going to be difficult to produce a text or HTML version for people on dialup.  Interestingly each page has a little hole where the fake Apple logo was.

http://www.miracle-planet.com/lol/mp3_player_manual.pdf

On another board the product has been summarised thusly:
"The manual is 22 pages without one meaningful sentence in it: the player may break in a month but the manual will still be there. Well worth it."

Here are some of the highlights I've found (I only had time for a brief flick through the thing before):

page 2
1.7.1  Give or get an electric shock the quantity many class manifestation.

page 4
4.1.3.2.1 ... Just delete the interface:
The deletion is to hint" delete the --- ".  Delete the failure: hint"  Delete the failure!"2 return the stop interface automatically behind.

page 5
4.2.2 Broadcast the interface manifestation
*The knife man - impulsive punishment:Broadcast the level is smooth to roll over.
*Grow to press NEXT key:For quick enter the function, until a knot tail of song.
page 13
6.  01:15,01 will not change, 15 mean the current recording document that catalogue have already

6.1.1.1 Elucidation: Carry on choosing the main dish catalogue (the Local Folder), the recording type (The REC Type) here, withdraw (Exit) ; enter activate the position as the position that the last time withdraw.

6.1.1.2.1.1 Mark the short key function of vegetables for the standard diagram.

page 16
7.2.1.5 Grow to press MENU, enter the main course list.

7.3 The automatic manhunt (the Auto search) can search to several broadcasting stations automatically.

page 18
10.  The telephone is originally.

page 21-22  (the punctuation is replicated exactly)

Different dimension function

General customers of MP3 will be perplex by "the data divulge a secret", "don't wish to let own" personal data" see by other people, can delete these" privacy"s first only while being the friend to use the MP3, resulting in the very big trouble thus.
Since today," different dimension" function that this machine provide resolved this problem thoroughly.

The customer can use the supplementary tool of this machine the disk of USB cut up into  arbitrarily comparison of two part, ( customer at compute on board can see two dish signs, the 2 Ks of Windows wants to install the SP4, otherwise can see a dish sign only, toing want to see another dish sign must choose "single and common dish" or"  the list encrypts the dish" under" system enactment/ the lin machine mode".)

[ITOS]

Different dimension function

This is actually a very usefull function when you have to put it in your pocket.

[Zedd]

Omg you are serious?

[superluser]

*Grow to press NEXT key

I forget...was that DRINK ME or EAT ME? 

There's also English as She is Spoke.  For years, I never knew that it had been an actual phrasebook.  I thought it was just an idiom for the concept that the English that you see in Warriner's English Grammar and Composition isn't the English that comes out of people's mouths.

Apparently, the book began life as a passable Portuguese-French phrasebook, but somebody decided to use i to make a Portuguese-English phrasebook by literally translating word for word all of the French into English.  So you get phrases like ``The walls have hearsay'' or ``What o'clock is it?''

[Aridas]

I don't know if it counts, but I have an electric shaver that has this line in the safety precautions.

1. Close supervision is necessary when this appliance is used by, on, or near children or invalids.

...When do children actually NEED shaving? If you're using it ON someone, aren't you already supervising fairly close? What's with the "invalids" wordage?

[Tapewolf]

Omg you are serious?

I'm afraid so.  The six-layer subsections alone are somewhat awe-inspiring.


http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k216/tapewolf/scraps/mp3-13.gif

1. Close supervision is necessary when this appliance is used by, on, or near children or invalids.
...When do children actually NEED shaving? If you're using it ON someone, aren't you already supervising fairly close? What's with the "invalids" wordage?

Dunno why it singles out the disabled, but to be fair, I needed to shave when I was about 15 or so.

[Zedd]

Im sure all you rember these from chainletters..Crazy warnings

Bowl Fresh
Safe to use around pets and children, although it is not recommended that either be permitted to drink from toilet.

Hair Coloring
Do not use as an ice cream topping.

Komatsu Floodlight
This floodlight is capable of illuminating large areas, even in the dark

Sleeping Pills
Warning: May cause Drowsiness

Bic Lighter
Ignite lighter away from face.

Old Spice Red Zone Deoderant
Use only on underarms.Zantac 75
Do not take if allergic to zantac.

Fix-a-Flat
WARNING: Do not weld can to rim.

Silk Soy Milk
Shake well and buy often

[Faerie Alex]

How about these, from another forum I visit? (But I haven't logged in in...like...years. )

[GabrielsThoughts]

clearly, the creators of this product used freetranslation or babblefish to translate the instructions into English. To be honest, as  I don't look at an instruction manual until after I've played with a gizmo for 8 hours, at that point I don't really need a manual. Besides, if you can't figure it out  how to work a gizmo on your own, you would  loose alot interest in the device and with experimentation your experience grows. 

[superluser]

1. Close supervision is necessary when this appliance is used by, on, or near children or invalids.

...When do children actually NEED shaving? If you're using it ON someone, aren't you already supervising fairly close? What's with the "invalids" wordage?

You could shave a kid's head.

But that's not why it's on there.  I'll tell you *exactly* why it's on there.  Let's say some kid takes the shaver and uses it on his baby brother's soft spot.  If they go to court, the shaver company can say, ``Didn't you read the warnings?''

It will absolutely limit their damages.  Maybe it already happened, and they had to add it.  As for invalids, if this is a translation, they might mean those with diminished mental capacity.  Same thinking as the ``children'' warning.

Hair Coloring
Do not use as an ice cream topping.

It's a floor wax!  It's a dessert topping!

[RJ]

The hell? 

[GabrielsThoughts]

is elucidation even a word?

Elusive: in a thesaurus it means ambiguous, baffling, cagey, deceitful, deceptive, elusory, equivocal, evanescent, fallacious, fleeting, fraudulent, fugacious, fugitive, greasy, illusory, imponderable, incomprehensible, indefinable, insubstantial, intangible, jivey, misleading, occult, phantom, puzzling, shifty, shy, slippery, stonewalling*, subtle, transient, transitory, tricky, unspecific, volatile

and my definition of the "tion":something in the process of doing something else i.e. Motivation, innovation, oxidation, or procrastination.

[superluser]

is elucidation even a word?

It's in the AH4.  It doesn't have anything to do with elusive.  Has to do with lux, lucis f.- light.  Eternal light, for example, is lux aeterna.  Didn't even have to crack my OED.

P.S. ``e.g.'' not ``i.e.''

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Industrial Engineer?

... Oh, wait. Nevermind.

[Aridas]

Elucidation is basically a fancy way of saying clarification. But anyway...

Superluser, the product in question is this: http://www.wired.com/testguide/fall2006/images/household/1306WIHSHOUS010.jpg

does your statement still hold up?

[superluser]

Superluser, the product in question is this: http://www.wired.com/testguide/fall2006/images/household/1306WIHSHOUS010.jpg

does your statement still hold up?

That's what I thought you meant by shaver.

And which statement?  If you cut your kid's hair off, I'm sure you can use that to maintain the stubble, and I'm also sure that if your kid messed around with that, he could get seriously hurt.  The soft spot example is prime.  The vibrations from that thing could seriously mess up someone's developing brain, or even kill him.

Plus, I remember having one of those a long time back.  You could run the thing while the safety screen was open, which meant that you had sharp, rapidly vibrating blades right out in the open.  It wasn't kid proof, either.  Just press a button and you've got blades o' death staring right at you.

Now, the chances that a kid would hurt himself with such a blade are probably a hundred million to one, but that's better than the Powerball.

[Aridas]

I didn't think you would use a facial hair thingie to deal with head hair.

[Tapewolf]

is elucidation even a word?

I think you'll find it means something like "enlightenment", meaning that something has been revealed to you, although it usually refers to something spiritual.

How about these, from another forum I visit? (But I haven't logged in in...like...years. )

Heh - I've seen most of these.  There was another one usually in that list which reads "Special noday: No ice cream", which IIRC was from Switzerland.

And of course "Keep out of children" on a carving knife.

[Aridas]

But I just addressed the elucidation issue, tape

[Tapewolf]

But I just addressed the elucidation issue, tape

I felt it could do with more detail.

[superluser]

I didn't think you would use a facial hair thingie to deal with head hair.

Most people wouldn't, but kids might try.

But I just addressed the elucidation issue, tape

But *I* addressed the elucidation issue, Aridas

Anyways, back to bad translations, there's always this translation of a playbill for Carmen:

"Act 1.  Carmen is a cigar-makeress from a tabago factory who loves with Don Jose of the mounting guard.  Carmen takes a flower from her corsets and lances it to Don Jose (Duet: 'Talk me of my mother').  There is a noise inside the tabago factory and the revolting cigar-makeresses burst into the stage.  Carmen is arrested and Don Jose is ordered to mounting guard her but Carmen subduces him and he lets her escape.

"Act 2.  The Tavern.  Carmen, Frasquito, Mercedes, Zuniga, Morales.  Carmen's aria ('The sistrums are tinkling').  Enter Escamillio, a balls-fighter.  Enter two smuglers (Duet: 'We have in mind a business') but Carmen refuses to penetrate because Don Jose has liberated her from prison.  He just now arrives (Aria: 'Stop, here who comes!') but hear are the bugles singing his retreat.  Don Jose will leave and draws his sword.  Called by Carmen shrieks the two smuglers interfere with her but Don Jose is bound to dessert, he will follow into them (final chorus: 'Opening sky wandering life').

"Act 3.  A roky landscape, the smuglers shelter.  Carmen sees her death in cards and Don Jose makes a date with Carmen for the next balls fight.

"Act 4.  A place in Seville.  Procession of balls-fighters, the roaring of the balls is heard in the arena.  Escamillio enters (Aria and chorus: 'Toreador, toreador, all hail the balls of a Toreador').  Enter Don Jose (Aria:  'I do not threaten, I besooch you') but Carmen repels him wants to join with Escamillio now chaired by the crowd.  Don Jose stabbs her (Aria: 'Oh rupture, rupture, you may arrest me, I did kill her') he sings 'Oh my beautiful Carmen, my subductive Carmen.'"

[Aridas]

Um, that wouldn't change the fact you need supervision while using it ON kids.

[GabrielsThoughts]

Industrial Engineer?

... Oh, wait. Nevermind.

i.e. = in example

[superluser]

Um, that wouldn't change the fact you need supervision while using it ON kids.

Right.  So that if a kid or someone not qualified to be a supervisor uses it on himself and gets hurt, they can say, ``Look!  We warned you!''

i.e. = in example

Bad translation!

i.e. = ``id est,'' Latin for ``It is,'' though idiomatically translated ``that is.''

e.g. = ``exempli gratia,'' Latin for ``an example with/by grace,'' idiomatically, ``for example.''

An oversimplification: e.g. is used when providing a few examples out of many.  i.e. is used when providing a clarification (it can also be used if you list all the examples).

e.g.:

The spelling for the acronym EKG comes from the language in which it was developed, i.e. German.