FAQs

1. What is the purpose of the New gTLD Program In YOUR Language? 

This program is supported by ICANN’s Language Services teams, leveraging cutting-edge AI and neural machine translation technologies to expand language access for New gTLD Program: Next Round outreach materials.

Volunteers can request a certain document to be translated into a specific language. Once translated, the document will then be posted as a Google Doc accessible from the community Wiki to be reviewed by volunteers within an allotted timeframe. The volunteer reviewers will check for factual, contextual, and material errors. Please note, the final translated documents are a simplified version of the published English version. 

Anyone can join the crowdsourced Collaborative Review process as a language volunteer to help refine translated outreach materials to ensure their accuracy and relevance for specific regions and communities. 

2. Will I be paid if I collaborate with a document review?

No, the New gTLD Program In YOUR Language program is a volunteer-based collaborative effort. 

3. What languages are included in the New gTLD Program In YOUR Language program?

The program is open to languages that are NOT part of the ICANN official language set: English, Spanish, French, Arabic, Chinese and Russian. 

Below, is a list of the initial languages that the Next Round outreach materials are being translated into:

• Bengali (BN)

• German (DE)

• Hindi (HI)

• Indonesian (ID)

• Italian (IT)

• Japanese (JA)

• Malay (MS)

• Polish (PL)

• Portuguese (PT)

• Korean (KO)

• Thai (TH)

• Turkish (TR)

4. What kind of documents are included for review in the New gTLD Program in YOUR Language?

Simplified documents of the current Next Round outreach materials were developed for use by the program. The documents that are currently available (or plan to be available) are:

• Next Round Info Sheet

• Next Round FAQ

• ASP Info Sheet

• ASP FAQ

• ASP Applicant Quick Start Guide

• ASP Applicant Checklist

• Next Round Deck (TBD)

• ASP Deck (TBD)

• ASP Application System Applicant User Guide (TBD)

5. Who is my point of contact to initiate a translation request?

Please contact the Stakeholder Engagement Vice President in your region. Contact information is available here.

6. Will the New gTLD Program In YOUR Language apply only to the New gTLD Program: Next Round  documents? 

No. In the future, we will also be supporting the ICANN in YOURYour Language program to extend this support to all ICANN outreach materials, which will be categorized and listed under the ICANN in YOUR Language page. 

7. Which collaborative platform is used for reviewing documents in the New gTLD Program In YOUR Language Program?

Google Docs will be used as the collaborative platform for reviewing documents. 

8. What happens when the allotted time for review is over?

Once the allotted time for review is reached, the document will need to be a clean version - no comments, suggested edits or any changes can be left unresolved. The ICANN Language Services team will include the legal disclosure and publish the document as a PDF available for download.

9. Can I still suggest a change after the review period has ended?

No. Once the allotted review time is over, the document cannot be edited or changed again.

10. What happens when more than one person is reviewing and the suggestions differ?

The nature of this program calls for collaboration. Teamwork provides better results, so we encourage a collaborative approach. When more than one person is working on the review of a document, it is important to engage in discussions with professionalism and courtesy. 

When suggesting a correction, provide a clear explanation and add a brief comment explaining the reason for your edit, especially if the issue is complex or nuanced.

Constructive feedback is encouraged.

11. Can I request a particular document to be translated?

Yes, you can. Please contact the Stakeholder Engagement Vice President in your region. Contact information is available here. 

12. Can I request for a document to be translated into a language I don’t see listed?

Yes, you can. Please contact the Stakeholder Engagement Vice President in your region. Contact information is available here. 

13. Can the translated/ final reviewed documents be distributed? 

Yes, either the AI/NMT version or the final volunteer-reviewed version, that is published as final, can be distributed by anyone who’s interested in spreading awareness of the Next Round. 

14. Who publishes the final reviewed document and where?

Once a final, simplified version is produced, the ICANN Language Services team will generate and publish a final PDF version to the corresponding page. 

15. Is there a limit to the number of reviewers? 

No, anyone interested can participate. 

16.  What translation engines or AI models does the program use? 

ICANN Language Services leverages several cutting-edge neural machine translation engines to cover the largest set of language combinations to offer the best services for underserved regions. 

17.  How does the program handle ICANN-specific acronyms, general terms, and cultural nuances? 

The ICANN Language Services team extracted key ICANN specific terminology from the chosen documents to develop a translated terminology database that was used to train the AI/NMT engines. This helps ensure the best possible results generated from the machine translations. 

18. Are translations stored permanently? 

At the discretion of ICANN, the ICANN Language Services team will retire outdated outreach documents and upload the most recent ones. 

19. Will the translated version look like the published English one?

Depending on the source file of the English version, the volunteer-reviewed translation may be in a simplified format. This improves the collaborative review process and minimizes the effort by volunteer-reviewers for formats not supported by Google Docs, like Adobe Illustrator, for example.