Posted: July 9th, 2004, 12:28 am
<a href='http://www.cocw.net/Global/chinese/20040509.htm' target='_blank'>http://www.cocw.net/Global/chinese/20040509.htm</a>
The China Times
May 9, 2004
LOTR Translator Luc Chu Localizes MIT Web Courses:
He resigns from his old job in order to devote himself to the project with the help of 49 volunteers. When completed, his work will be presented to the country.
Do you want to study at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) yet don't have enough money and have problems passing TOEFL? In 2001, MIT announced that all relevant materials for its courses will be put on-line to constitute MIT OpenCourseWare (MIT OCW). Over 700 courses have been made available-from aeronautics to women's studies. Some of the courses only provide syllabus, readings, calendar and assignments, while others even provide video-taped lectures and reports from MIT students.
The great variety of OCW and the quality contents from the prestigious MIT have attracted countless users outside the United States. More importantly, for instructors and students in developing countries who can't afford to study in the US, OCW serves as an on-line university.
Nevertheless, in addition to terminology and jargon used in various fields, OCW is also done in English which means that students in Taiwan might find it difficult to use the website. Luc Chu, the famous translator of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, felt that there was a necessity to localize OCW into Chinese, and so started planning the OCW localization project last September. He then resigned from his job at the Cit? Group in March this year and dedicated himself to translating the project. (http://www.twow.net/)
Luc explained that he translated the website from scratch with virtually "zero resources" and simply recruited volunteer translators via the Internet. Currently, there are 49 volunteers, from college graduates to scholars. Luc estimated that volunteers will be able to complete all the OCW courses in two years and by then, the entire Chinese website will be donated to the country in the hope of further facilitating cooperation between Taiwan's academic circles and MIT. Having earned quite an amazing amount from the royalties from The Lord of the Rings, Luc said it's now time for him to contribute to society, even though the project may cost him all the royalties he earned. Yet for the sake of speeding up the project, he hopes there will be more and more assistance and resources dedicated to OCW localization.
Three Courses have been Completed Scholars believe the project will be very useful
With the concerted efforts of an array of volunteers, three courses from the renowned MIT OCW have been translated into Chinese. Luc Chu, the leader of the project, said that scholars and graduate students will learn about academic trends from around the world through OCW. Luc stated that MIT OCW may help instructors enhance their curricula and graduate students learn more about up-to-date information in specific fields. Professor Anthony Mao of the Department of Library and Information Science at Fu-jen Catholic University said that the idea of translating OCW was brilliant, yet it would be even better with assistance from Taiwan's academic fields during the process of localization. Moreover, the translated courses should be "promoted" on campus so that instructors and students will gain proper access to them. In fact, National Sun Yat-sen University's "Cyber University" opened a course (elerning.700.net.tw) to discuss how to learn and teach with the help of OCW. People who are interested in this can view discussions, and students taking the course are currently trying to translate and learn from a course entitled "Data Communication Networks; Fall 2002".
The China Times
May 9, 2004
LOTR Translator Luc Chu Localizes MIT Web Courses:
He resigns from his old job in order to devote himself to the project with the help of 49 volunteers. When completed, his work will be presented to the country.
Do you want to study at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) yet don't have enough money and have problems passing TOEFL? In 2001, MIT announced that all relevant materials for its courses will be put on-line to constitute MIT OpenCourseWare (MIT OCW). Over 700 courses have been made available-from aeronautics to women's studies. Some of the courses only provide syllabus, readings, calendar and assignments, while others even provide video-taped lectures and reports from MIT students.
The great variety of OCW and the quality contents from the prestigious MIT have attracted countless users outside the United States. More importantly, for instructors and students in developing countries who can't afford to study in the US, OCW serves as an on-line university.
Nevertheless, in addition to terminology and jargon used in various fields, OCW is also done in English which means that students in Taiwan might find it difficult to use the website. Luc Chu, the famous translator of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, felt that there was a necessity to localize OCW into Chinese, and so started planning the OCW localization project last September. He then resigned from his job at the Cit? Group in March this year and dedicated himself to translating the project. (http://www.twow.net/)
Luc explained that he translated the website from scratch with virtually "zero resources" and simply recruited volunteer translators via the Internet. Currently, there are 49 volunteers, from college graduates to scholars. Luc estimated that volunteers will be able to complete all the OCW courses in two years and by then, the entire Chinese website will be donated to the country in the hope of further facilitating cooperation between Taiwan's academic circles and MIT. Having earned quite an amazing amount from the royalties from The Lord of the Rings, Luc said it's now time for him to contribute to society, even though the project may cost him all the royalties he earned. Yet for the sake of speeding up the project, he hopes there will be more and more assistance and resources dedicated to OCW localization.
Three Courses have been Completed Scholars believe the project will be very useful
With the concerted efforts of an array of volunteers, three courses from the renowned MIT OCW have been translated into Chinese. Luc Chu, the leader of the project, said that scholars and graduate students will learn about academic trends from around the world through OCW. Luc stated that MIT OCW may help instructors enhance their curricula and graduate students learn more about up-to-date information in specific fields. Professor Anthony Mao of the Department of Library and Information Science at Fu-jen Catholic University said that the idea of translating OCW was brilliant, yet it would be even better with assistance from Taiwan's academic fields during the process of localization. Moreover, the translated courses should be "promoted" on campus so that instructors and students will gain proper access to them. In fact, National Sun Yat-sen University's "Cyber University" opened a course (elerning.700.net.tw) to discuss how to learn and teach with the help of OCW. People who are interested in this can view discussions, and students taking the course are currently trying to translate and learn from a course entitled "Data Communication Networks; Fall 2002".