Mechanical Turk: Now with 40.92% Spam. • Hacker News Board

Re: Mechanical Turk: Now with 40.92% Spam.

#21

Post by khafra » Fri, Dec 17, 2010, 4:06 PM UTC

natala wrote: post #12

nmcfarl wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have to say that although it feels that way, lately they've been sort of active. They've been using twitter since October at: http://twitter.com/amazonmturk And they just launched launched a blog at: http://mechanicalturk.typepad.com/ Largely I attribute this to Natala Menezes, their newish Product Manager.

Nathan, thank you for the kind words -- but I really can't take any credit. Just know we are actively listening and we take all the feedback, even the controversial bits, very seriously.

The obvious question: do you have a computer program set to alert you if "natala" appears on a tech site in a mturk context, or a mechanical turk task set with a 10 cent payment to email you whenever you're mentioned?

Re: Mechanical Turk: Now with 40.92% Spam.

#22

Post by byoung2 » Fri, Dec 17, 2010, 4:16 PM UTC

trotsky wrote: post #6

andrewljohnson wrote: post #4

At first, I thought MTurk was good for getting translation work done, and checked by others. It worked OK, but I had to be clever to avoid the cheaters who would ignore instructions not to use machine translation. After refining my tactics, talking to a lot of workers, and fending off the crooks, I got a few decent translations (for my iPhone app). Then I tried a new tactic. I hired some pros from various translation…

It seems to be a failed social experiment to me, there is definitely a negative feedback loop there. Bad HITS, low wages, withheld payments, bad workers, sweatshops. Hard to imagine it will get any better. I wonder if you reversed the process and had projects bid on workers if it could counter the race to the bottom effect. Include a system where work could be divided into common types and include worker metrics and…

It sounds like you have a great idea for a startup to bring some competition to this area.

Re: Mechanical Turk: Now with 40.92% Spam.

#23

Post by ig1 » Fri, Dec 17, 2010, 4:57 PM UTC

I think mturk is vastly underdeveloped, there are all sorts of things people could be using it for, but don't simply because they don't know about it or it's too complex.

Before I started my current startup, creating an mturk competitor was something I considered, but the fundamental problem is handling the payments. Most payment processors wouldn't touch you due to the risk of fraud without a huge (>1mm) deposit.

Paying individuals small amount of money is hard, you pretty much have to use paypal, and if you're lucky enough not to have your account suspended they'll completely rip you on the charges. And you'll still carry all the risk of people trying to use your system for money laundering.

Re: Mechanical Turk: Now with 40.92% Spam.

#24

Post by rgrieselhuber » Fri, Dec 17, 2010, 5:55 PM UTC

andrewljohnson wrote: post #4

At first, I thought MTurk was good for getting translation work done, and checked by others. It worked OK, but I had to be clever to avoid the cheaters who would ignore instructions not to use machine translation. After refining my tactics, talking to a lot of workers, and fending off the crooks, I got a few decent translations (for my iPhone app). Then I tried a new tactic. I hired some pros from various translation…

I'm starting to use MyGengo quite a bit for translations. It's more expensive than MT but the quality is great and service is super-fast.

Re: Mechanical Turk: Now with 40.92% Spam.

#25

Post by zacharycohn » Fri, Dec 17, 2010, 6:02 PM UTC

khafra wrote: post #21

natala wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nathan, thank you for the kind words -- but I really can't take any credit. Just know we are actively listening and we take all the feedback, even the controversial bits, very seriously.

The obvious question: do you have a computer program set to alert you if "natala" appears on a tech site in a mturk context, or a mechanical turk task set with a 10 cent payment to email you whenever you're mentioned?

Google Alerts.

Re: Mechanical Turk: Now with 40.92% Spam.

#26

Post by DenisM » Fri, Dec 17, 2010, 7:36 PM UTC

d_r wrote: post #10

andrewljohnson wrote: post #4

At first, I thought MTurk was good for getting translation work done, and checked by others. It worked OK, but I had to be clever to avoid the cheaters who would ignore instructions not to use machine translation. After refining my tactics, talking to a lot of workers, and fending off the crooks, I got a few decent translations (for my iPhone app). Then I tried a new tactic. I hired some pros from various translation…

Not 100% relevant to this thread, but if it helps, I've had success with http://www.icanlocalize.com for localizing apps. They assign a human translator for your strings and are accommodating with custom directions you might have. They'll even take your strings file from Xcode. (Disclaimer: I'm not affiliated with this site, your mileage may wary.)

what's more important - they will return you files fit for XCode! icanlocalize is awesome.

Re: Mechanical Turk: Now with 40.92% Spam.

#27

Post by klous » Fri, Dec 17, 2010, 7:37 PM UTC

staunch wrote: post #5

It's unbelievable that no one has swooped in to crush MTurk given how little Amazon has done to develop it since 2005(!)

A worldwide crowdsource platform for the workers who only have access to cell phones is txteagle http://txteagle.com/ and article written on them: http://www.technologyreview.com/printer_friendly_article.asp...

Re: Mechanical Turk: Now with 40.92% Spam.

#28

Post by natala » Sat, Dec 18, 2010, 3:15 AM UTC

khafra wrote: post #21

natala wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nathan, thank you for the kind words -- but I really can't take any credit. Just know we are actively listening and we take all the feedback, even the controversial bits, very seriously.

The obvious question: do you have a computer program set to alert you if "natala" appears on a tech site in a mturk context, or a mechanical turk task set with a 10 cent payment to email you whenever you're mentioned?

;-) No. I found out the old fashioned way -- a friend saw the post and sent it to me. He reads YCombinator news much more frequently than me! It does help to have a unique name...