5 ms·

Terrible grammar, but probably means something like the following: "These guys were desperate to find hot white girlfriends, but nobody would date them so they

Terrible grammar, but probably means something like the following: "These guys were desperate to find hot white girlfriends, but nobody would date them so they resorted to writing this lewd software. I'd advise them to work on something useful instead." I've found that the general rule is, if you see a Japanese-language comment on an English-language website it's most likely 1) not written by a Japanese and 2) offensive to varying degrees.

MauranKilom 6y ago
I don't understand the motivation for such comments, especially when (as you assert) written by a non-Japanese person. Who is the target audience?
- sho_hn 6y ago
  I'd guess other non-Japanese-speakers? Throwing the comment at Google Translate/Papago is easy enough, and might register as "there's a Japanese troll/spam problem". Maybe generating this impression is the objective? It'd be a form of nerd-sniping - if you feel satisfied with yourself over going the extra step of using a tool, you might stop thinking critically at that point and be susceptible to being duped.
- yutopia 6y ago
  My guess is that it’s an inside joke of some kind, targeted at English speakers with some knowledge of Japanese. When I was a kid my classmates would often ask me to teach them dirty English slangs, which they’ll say out loud in front of teachers. They got a kick out of the fact that they can say naughty things without the adults noticing. So yeah I think it’s grade school humor, fairly innocuous stuff but kind of weird to see on HN.
  - kazinator 6y ago
    冗談じゃなくて、その研究者の目を覚ますように真面目に書きました。だから、文法が完璧じゃなくても、日本語で頑張りました。ところで、文法が良くなくても、yutopiaさんがすんなり分かってくれてよかった。きっと、その研究者たちも分かるでしょう。ご確認してくれてありがとう。（正直言えば、文法より単語に集中しています。何故なら、良くない文法で英語を喋る人が多い。それなのに、その人は、問題なく北米で暮らしています。しかも、医者やエンジニアー等として働きます。ですが、単語を持ってない人は、失語になります。折角の時に緊張して言いたい言葉言えなくなる。文法よりも単語は大事。）
    - yutopia 6y ago
      So you say it wasn’t a joke, you wrote the original comment in Japanese because it was your sincere opinion and you wanted the researchers to understand. Not sure I follow. If that were the case you should have written in English, obviously. The paper is written in English, some of the authors have Japanese names but we don’t know if they’re native Japanese speakers, the last author (team leader) has a Chinese name, and everyone who does CS research at this level will understand English just fine.
      - kazinator 6y ago
        たしかに、残念ながらその点で間違えてしまいそうでした。認めます。 > if my translation was fair. だって、簡単に言えば、どんなに原典の文法が崩れても、出てこない言葉は出てきません。
kazinator 6y ago
That the grammar is "terrible" is an exaggeration; I have decent confidence. Although the main gist of it is right, the translation is embellished, and I suspect deliberately so. The tone is deliberately harsh. "lewd" is usually (and certainly in this context) not a good translation of エッチ; "lewd" is a negative word that is better corresponds to concepts like いやらしい or maybe 淫らな. Nothing like "nobody would date them" is written or implied, just that they can't find that type of woman (そういう女性) to date them, for whatever reason. It doesn't imply they don't have girlfriends, or even that a woman such as what they modeled in the software wouldn't want them; no speculation is posited about why that woman isn't there. 付き合ってくれる人がいない does not mean "nobody would date s/o". I also didn't use any phrase that corresponds to "desperate" like 窮余 or 絶望 or what have you.
- yutopia 6y ago
  FWIW this is the original comment (now flagged): この奴ら、ね、素敵な白人女性の彼女どうしても欲しがってて、そういう付き合ってくれる女性に合えなくて、やっとこのエッチなソフトを作ったに違いない。何とか役に立つ仕事をしたほうがいい。 People can come to their own conclusions whether the grammar is indeed terrible and if my translation was fair.

MauranKilom 6y ago

I don't understand the motivation for such comments, especially when (as you assert) written by a non-Japanese person. Who is the target audience?

sho_hn 6y ago
I'd guess other non-Japanese-speakers? Throwing the comment at Google Translate/Papago is easy enough, and might register as "there's a Japanese troll/spam problem". Maybe generating this impression is the objective? It'd be a form of nerd-sniping - if you feel satisfied with yourself over going the extra step of using a tool, you might stop thinking critically at that point and be susceptible to being duped.
yutopia 6y ago
My guess is that it’s an inside joke of some kind, targeted at English speakers with some knowledge of Japanese. When I was a kid my classmates would often ask me to teach them dirty English slangs, which they’ll say out loud in front of teachers. They got a kick out of the fact that they can say naughty things without the adults noticing. So yeah I think it’s grade school humor, fairly innocuous stuff but kind of weird to see on HN.
- kazinator 6y ago
  冗談じゃなくて、その研究者の目を覚ますように真面目に書きました。だから、文法が完璧じゃなくても、日本語で頑張りました。ところで、文法が良くなくても、yutopiaさんがすんなり分かってくれてよかった。きっと、その研究者たちも分かるでしょう。ご確認してくれてありがとう。（正直言えば、文法より単語に集中しています。何故なら、良くない文法で英語を喋る人が多い。それなのに、その人は、問題なく北米で暮らしています。しかも、医者やエンジニアー等として働きます。ですが、単語を持ってない人は、失語になります。折角の時に緊張して言いたい言葉言えなくなる。文法よりも単語は大事。）
  - yutopia 6y ago
    So you say it wasn’t a joke, you wrote the original comment in Japanese because it was your sincere opinion and you wanted the researchers to understand. Not sure I follow. If that were the case you should have written in English, obviously. The paper is written in English, some of the authors have Japanese names but we don’t know if they’re native Japanese speakers, the last author (team leader) has a Chinese name, and everyone who does CS research at this level will understand English just fine.
    - kazinator 6y ago
      たしかに、残念ながらその点で間違えてしまいそうでした。認めます。 > if my translation was fair. だって、簡単に言えば、どんなに原典の文法が崩れても、出てこない言葉は出てきません。

kazinator 6y ago

That the grammar is "terrible" is an exaggeration; I have decent confidence. Although the main gist of it is right, the translation is embellished, and I suspect deliberately so. The tone is deliberately harsh. "lewd" is usually (and certainly in this context) not a good translation of エッチ; "lewd" is a negative word that is better corresponds to concepts like いやらしい or maybe 淫らな. Nothing like "nobody would date them" is written or implied, just that they can't find that type of woman (そういう女性) to date them, for whatever reason. It doesn't imply they don't have girlfriends, or even that a woman such as what they modeled in the software wouldn't want them; no speculation is posited about why that woman isn't there. 付き合ってくれる人がいない does not mean "nobody would date s/o". I also didn't use any phrase that corresponds to "desperate" like 窮余 or 絶望 or what have you.

yutopia 6y ago
FWIW this is the original comment (now flagged): この奴ら、ね、素敵な白人女性の彼女どうしても欲しがってて、そういう付き合ってくれる女性に合えなくて、やっとこのエッチなソフトを作ったに違いない。何とか役に立つ仕事をしたほうがいい。 People can come to their own conclusions whether the grammar is indeed terrible and if my translation was fair.