After a two week siesta of preparing for and celebrating CSOFT’s annual localization extravaganza, Wacky Word Wednesday, a weekly celebration of the wackiest and most interesting words from around the world, is back as we hoot our way into the night.

From TermWiki.com, the definition of today’s wacky word:

lu·cu·bra·tion [loo-kyoo-brey-shuhn] -noun laborious work, study, or thought that happens, especially at night; to work or write in a detailed, scholarly manner

The etymology of lucubration stems from the Latin lucubrationem, which means “nocturnal study, night work.” Lucubration is also related to lucubrare, which means “to work by artificial light”; this is derived from lucere, “to shine”. Lucubration also has a second meaning, referring to any solemn literary work that is the product of laborious and scholarly concentration, which can take place at any time of the day (or night).

Inna Geller is the founder of Geller Translation Solutions, a firm focused on providing translation management consulting services for organizations in highly regulated industries. Prior to founding Geller Translation Solutions, Inna supplied 18 years of senior leadership for the translation/localization function at Medtronic, a Fortune 500 producer of medical devices. This certified Green Belt in Six/Lean Sigma methodology can be seen at many events around the world, where she speaks on topics for a variety of organizations like the American Marketing Association, Life Science Alley, the Society of Technical Communications and others.

Earlier this month, CSOFT hosted our 8th Annual World Operations Summit, a week-long event traditionally hosted at CSOFT’s World Headquarters in the heart of Beijing. During this event, we invite our extended team members from around the world—including linguists, clients and industry experts—for an intensive series of training sessions, presentations, teambuilding and localization-focused discussions.

This year, we were thrilled to have Inna Geller of Geller Translation Solutions join us as a guest speaker. Her presentation on translation risk management was so informative and precise that we asked her if she was willing to do a follow-up interview to expound her risk management expertise for the benefit of our audience. Lucky for you and I, she generously agreed! So check out the interview below to find out what the lovely and talented Inna Geller has to say about translation risk management.

As promised, check out the photos below for a snapshot of the various events that took place during our 2011 World Operations Summit from earlier this month! Since 2004, CSOFT has held an annual operations summit with a different theme, though the purpose has remained consistent: to take part in discussions, engage in learning, and align ourselves with CSOFT’s goals as a quality-driven language service provider. The themes throughout the years have ranges from Accelerating for Growth to Cultivating an Innovative Culture and Passion for Excellence. This year’s theme, A Whole New World, was not only accompanied by song (with North American representation!), but also by the belief that CSOFT is paving a new road to unparalleled innovation and progression within the localization industry.

It was indeed quite the localization extravaganza, and we’re very happy to share it with you all! (Click on the pictures to enlarge them.)

We had the great privilege and pleasure of welcoming Dr. JoAnn Hackos of Comtech Services to our World Localization Summit last week. In addition to the great honor of having her compete in CSOFT’s annual Stump the Experts game, it was most enlightening to listen in on her keynote presentation on The Role of the OASIS DITA Standard in Translation Management, which outlined the importance of information management and the impact DITA can have on managing translation.

The following is a brief summary of JoAnn’s presentation.

JoAnn Hackos, presenting at CSOFT’s 2011 World Operations Summit.

In keeping with CSOFT tradition, at the end of last week’s World Localization Summit our President and CEO, Ms. Shunee Yee, hosted a Friday Night Party for all of CSOFT’s internal and extended team members, some clients, friends, as well as localization industry experts. Before wine bottles were uncorked and the festivities began, we were all treated to the inaugural CSOFT International Symphony, which was a concert personally hosted by Shunee for all of her friends and colleagues.

The pieces chosen for the concert were all hand-picked around a loose tribute to classical music used in theatre, movies, and television, which made for a pretty interesting mix. And it also made for the best opening sequence to a symphony orchestra ever, which we’ve uploaded to YouTube for your viewing pleasure:

Every year, CSOFT hosts an annual Summit in which we invite our global team of linguists, business development managers, operational experts, clients, and fellow industry experts from around the world to CSOFT’s World Headquarters for a week of learning, sharing, discussion and team-building. It’s an exciting, action-packed week of discussions, presentations, and not a whole lot of sleep!

For CSOFT employees and extended team members, the summit serves two purposes: the first being to further strengthen our bonds as CSOFT members and to remain united in our goals and vision; the second is to better align ourselves with the most recent developments within the industry, in terms of technology, best practices and standards.

TermWiki’s extended functionality and intuitive user interface have been designed from the ground up to facilitate quick integration into a variety of different workflows (including casual browsing). That said, we would like to take this opportunity to make sure that you understand how you can personally make the most of TermWiki.

For this entry, we’ll focus on three different types of users (you can click on the links below to skip to each individual section):

• General Users

• Translators

• Corporations

And if you have any specific questions about how TermWiki.com might appeal to other types of users, please feel free and ask in the comments section below!

For today’s Wacky Word Wednesday, a weekly celebration of the wackiest and most interesting words from around the world, we’ll take you back to a period of time when sliced bread and a glass of milk meant more than…well, sliced bread and a glass of milk!

Today’s Wacky Word definition from TermWiki.com:

milque·toast [milk-tohst] -noun a timid, meek, or unassertive person

American comic creator H. T. Webster was born in 1885. By the time he was twenty, he was already publishing comics in Recreation magazine; by 1912, he was working for the New York Tribune as a daily cartoonist. H.T. Webster himself was sometimes called “The Mark Twain of American cartoonists” because of his humor and delivery.