Translating an Ebook in 2021: Is It Worth It?

Electronic publishing, ebooks, and the self-publishing sector have revolutionized the publishing market in the same way MP3s revolutionized the music market years ago.

The opportunity to publish ebooks (or paperbacks in print-on-demand) and also have them distributed across multiple stores with just a very small investment (and regardless of the publishing houses) opens up possibilities that until now were the sole privilege of a few successful authors (or to those who have the means to self-finance their publications).

Beyond just providing food for thought, we want to use this article to showcase a tool for calculating the cost of translating an ebook or print-on-demand book, and for getting a sense of what the earnings might be like for both the author and the translator under a royalty-sharing agreement.

We will also try to discern the most appropriate business model for offering translation services to ebook authors in self-publishing - without claiming to know it all and based solely on our personal experience and research, of course - all as a starting point for further discussion and reflection.

With self-publishing services like Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing, Smashwords.com, and StreetLib, one of the leading portals in Italy, being so easy to use, the number of works available on online bookshops has increased dramatically.

Among authors, those who attain a certain level of success in their home countries begin to look to ebook translators to evaluate the possibility of having their work translated into other languages, most often with the English-speaking market in mind.

This would seem to be a huge opportunity for translators. However, at the risk of jumping to conclusions, we might say that translation costs are only sustainable for those who sell a very large number of copies.

In fact, while digital self-publishing may have marginalized the publisher’s role in the “author-publisher-translator” equation, the same basic assumptions about exportation still apply: To afford to translate your book, you need to sell thousands of copies.

What are the advantages of self-publishing for authors?

To begin with, let’s call the way in which an organization or project creates and transmits value a “business model”.

A print-on-demand or ebook author will see the following elements as valuable:

• distributing their text on foreign-language markets (especially the English-language market)
• entrusting the book to a translator willing to translate ebooks in exchange for a share of royalties (meaning an author can even translate their book without an initial investment)
• if necessary, dividing the text up between several translators to minimize translation time.

What advantages does self-publishing have for ebook translators?

Translators, whether professional or amateur, see value in a system that allows them to:

• get fair pay for their translation work
• collect royalties over an extended period of time, which (in the long run) may even amount to more than payment for the translation work alone
• have their name tied to a successful book or author.

Translation is only a sustainable option for best-selling texts

While self-publishing is well and truly revolutionary in terms of cost reductions from the author’s perspective, to the translator, translating ebooks is no different to translating printed books, neither in terms of costs nor time.

We might assume that the inherent ease implied in self-publication will give rise to a huge number of texts for translation, thereby also increasing the demand for translators. However, the cost of human translation (not necessarily by professionals), can be prohibitive in that it only makes the service available to authors whose books are very successful.

In fact, even when we consider rates well below the market standard, the cost of translating an ebook of about 100 pages will barely drop below 1000 euro (with both the translation and correction phases considered). For medium-long texts, this can easily be more than 5000 euro.

To get these figures, we created a calculation tool, which is available for free, albeit in a completely experimental version, and serves to estimate how worthwhile certain scenarios could be.

On the other hand, choosing to translate a widely circulated ebook while sharing its royalties can result in a translator earning figures an order of magnitude higher than just pay per translated word or flat rate.

This also means that the translation of poorly distributed ebooks is unlikely to be done by professional translators, as the revenue generated by royalties would not sufficiently cover the cost (if a model based only on royalties is assumed).

These texts could still be available to non-professional translators, students or recreational translators, for whom revenues not in line with those of the market could be attractive. But this isn’t the place to start a discussion on the quality of translations carried out by amateurs. The question is, once again, simply one of numbers: given the ease with which one can (self-) publish an ebook, it would be logical to think that the range of texts available for translation would far exceed the number of professional translators available, which would open the field up to amateurs, i.e. non-professional translators, as well.

However, even with this considered, any newly business model proposed should catch the attention of professional translators, and offer them a real advantage, something more than just “another job”. Gaining protracted income from a one-off job like this could be an extra advantage.

New business models for translating ebooks or print-on-demand publications?

Solving this riddle would lead to a situation where:

• authors can get their books translated at “off-market” prices, while maintaining a publishable quality
• translators receive fair payment for their work
• the distribution platform gets to take their standard commission

frankly, this seems unattainable. Play around a bit with the calculation tool above, and you will see why it is easy to come to this conclusion.

One option could be to divide the translation work between multiple translators (more than five at least, for medium-length books), using crowdsourcing. However, this option has some disadvantages that are difficult to compensate.

The limits of crowdsourcing for ebook translation

There are at least 4 problems that come with crowdsourcing:

1. how the text to be translated should be divided up
2. fragmented earnings
3. guaranteeing completion
4. system set-up and maintenance.

1. Historically, crowdsourcing has been used to localise open-source software (like the Firefox interface for example, along with a huge number of other programs). In these cases, breaking the original text up into parts is rather simple, as it mainly consists of separate strings, which are often self-contained.

Yet, even in such cases, terminological problems and syntactic inconsistency are often noted (i.e. the same word or the same original sentence is translated in different ways).

Dividing up an essay or a novel would lead to even greater consistency problems. Even a careful review phase could turn into a full on rewrite.

2. If the text to be translated is shared between several translators, their royalties will also have to be shared, with an extreme fragmentation of income that would make it possible to follow this path only for very successful books.

3. A further problem is guaranteeing completeness: how do you insure yourself against being abandoned? Who ensures that all the translators involved deliver their part on time? While it is true that some best sellers get translated by the community of readers even before their official translation comes out (think Harry Potter, for example), in such cases, the community has an in-depth knowledge of the universe in which the story takes place, and are therefore much less likely to make consistency mistakes and are very highly motivated by their passion. And we are talking about projects with a global audience, where large numbers make any collaborative approach possible.

4. The last two points would require the intervention of moderators, where, in the writer’s view, any support system for collaboration between authors and translators should be (almost) fully automatic.

An example of failure: Babelcube

Someone did actually try to create a portal with similar features to those described here. The project is called Babelcube, and it was conceived as a way of putting authors in contact with translators and establishing incremental royalty sharing, i.e. royalty rates that change over time as the number of copies sold increases. We recommend looking at the website to get a clear sense of it.

However, our own experience with this platform has been utterly negative. When we published one of our own ebooks (The Irreplaceable Translator), we uploaded it to Babelcube to have it translated into other languages. We were answered by a Portuguese translator, Rosangela Fasolato, who did a very professional job of the translation.

Unfortunately however, after delivering the translation, the Portuguese version was stuck in limbo for months. Numerous messages sent to the service and even a few complaint tweets had no effect whatsoever.

.@babelcube I’ve been waiting to see our new book published for 3 months (translation was delivered, and all procedures correctly done). No answer from your support. Are you still in business or what?

— M.Cevoli / Qabiria (@qabiria) September 27, 2018

After almost a year, coincidentally before we could legally terminate the current contract and publish the translation on our own, the book was finally published by Amazon and Streetlib (links no longer working). As for the book’s publication status on the other platforms Babelcube was supposed to distribute it to, the screenshot below has not changed in the past year.

The royalties accrued to date are laughable (less than 10 euro), and - frankly - we are even starting to doubt the accuracy of the figures received. Our impression is that the project has simply not been lucrative enough and has therefore been abandoned, despite the fact that the registration procedure is still active. Basically, it’s a wasted opportunity.

It’s tempting to imagine: what if it were a gambling portal?

If what we have said is true, which is that translation and expansion into foreign markets is the sole privilege of those who write best-sellers, ultimately, in terms of technical news, there is nothing new under the sun.

Where before publishing houses may have relied on a combination of sales obtained in the countries of origin and their own intuition to choose which foreign authors to publish, in the ebook market it is the individual translator who plays the role of talent scout, which we may say is facilitated by specialized platforms made available by distributors, i.e. to exploit collective intelligence.

The limitations and unknown consequences of this model are certainly many. There are many ways in which this approach can be implemented. As well as direct contact between individual authors and translators, we would like to see the creation of online meeting points, perhaps even ones attached to existing distribution portals.

Thus far, however, we have made these bricks without the straw, that is the distributors, who are often the ones who own the technology that lets you set up online bookstores or distribute books in existing bookstores. Distributors earn a sales-based percentage, and therefore have every interest in expanding the number of books on their platforms as much as possible.

The option that seems most sustainable to us is therefore that of an additional section within the distribution portals. This section would be a completely self-regulated area in which translators “bid” for the books that in their opinion (and that of the system) have the greatest chance of success, and this is why they are willing to be paid in royalties, rather than asking for payment based on the words translated.

One other possibility could be a “mixed” model, where translators receive an advance first, and the royalties are agreed later. In this scenario, the distributor risks nothing and can pursue their sole objective of expanding their catalogue by offering translation services as an added value for its own users without discarding direct sales of additional services (such as checking and correcting translated texts).

The portal should be structured as a community of authors and translators in which translators try to grab the best-selling books in order to have the best chance of collecting the largest royalties, while authors promote their books to be chosen by the “best” translators (those best rated by authors who have already enjoyed their services).

And it’s only going to get more complicated from here on out: the structure and features of such a portal need to be outlined and - most importantly - the lucrative potential of such an undertaking should be very carefully evaluated. This is something we’ll try to calculate sooner or later, perhaps even based on what comments and opinions we receive in response to this article.

Nota: this entry was originally written on 07/01/2013 and updated on 02/01/2021. Some comments may refer to revised or corrected parts.