Rough ascii requirements

[Erica Abbott]

Happy Saturday! I was just wondering if you could all tell me what you change for a rough ascii before it goes out. Do you just translate steno untranslates and nothing else? Or do you change the speaker names to the right people, read through it entirely and fix stuff you see quickly??

I really haven't done a rough ascii before, and I want to make sure I am sending them what they're expecting.

Thanks!!

[Kelli Combs (admin)]

Yes, the software does put in the by lines. I only found out about that, however, about 5 months ago. Silly me writing them in by hand if I did not stroke it first. What a waste of time.

[Judy]

It depends what I'm being paid. My clients, my charges, I go through it once very quickly. It's generally almost ready for proofreading. If I'm working for another agency and they pay me what I pay myself, they get the same deal. If I'm working for another agency and they're paying me chump change, they get what they pay for and I scan for any places I need to listen to the audio, I'll fill in speaker IDs, try to get names in correctly, and do a spellcheck.

Rachel & Kelli, doesn't your software put in the BY lines for you?

[Erica Abbott]

It's just that this job is 800 pages, with a two pages of names, which they were not really prepared to give me at the job. I am fixing them and putting phonetics, and am going to fill in the by-lines. I guess I will fill in all the steno and then try to quick skim it to make sure it all makes sense. It is just such a big file.

Thanks for all of your comments

[Deborah M.]

I do a lot of roughs. I always put in all spellings that I've gotten (usually do that on the job as I'm going along during breaks anyway.) I put in speakers. I take out all untrans. I go to wherever I wrote notes and fix any major problems. I try not to spend time putting in punctuation although sometimes I can't help myself. I probably spend a lot more time than I should but I hate to have something going out looking really bad.

[Rachel Gard]

I basically to what Kelli does except I don't put in the BY lines.

[Kelli Combs (admin)]

I fill in speakers and put in all the names that come up in the transcript correctly and make sure there are no untranslated words; everything is readable. I put in all the BY... lines. That is about it.

[Katiana Ball]

I fill in the speakers.

Everything below is things that I know are not mandatory, but I do to make it easier for the person reading and also to look more "amazing."

I also look for my "mark" symbol and fill in any drops where it is.

I try to J-define words. like if the name was "reid" and I have it written as "reed" or I would do a search and replace.

I scan for numbers and try to get the right formatting.

Also, for the rough asciis I've done, turnaround time is 24 hours, I just try to do as much as I can, and hopefully even turn in the transcript.


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