My first question: Do you have any feedback from the project leaders concerning the quality of translations? Positive or negative critiques, suggestions, anything.
This is something we are working on. We have just on-boarded @lovenfreedom as our VIPO manager. One of the critical aspects of this position is to create the communications bridge between us and the projects we are supporting, in order to gather their feedbacks as well as requiring them to be proactive.
Do they see our work as something valuable *(and would they put the price on that)?
Well I'd say you did a great job to bring your concerns to the projects. If they don't care, then I agree probably we should higher up the requirements. Do you have any specific suggestion on this topic?
Projects are getting free translations, translators are getting coins, what do we get as the community?
This brings me back to the first point. By creating the communication bridge we will require projects satisfied with our support to give back. We still need to define exactly what, ideas are around SP purchase and delegation, credits and more. Let me know if you have any specific suggestion on this topic as well.
In order to have solid ground for negotiations, the quality needs to be fostered. It leads to an important thing we are missing now (according to Discord discussions). All of us, LM, TR, need to understand that we are replaceable. My (a bit long shot) suggestion is to encourage LMs to change their translators if they are not good enough. For me, it's a mystery why there are translators who never do good translation - still translation. Also, LMs must be responsible for errors. We already have quantity, now we need quality.
From my POV, you should primarily focus on the real economy (real money). In that case, Utopian/DaVinci could have the edge, as your contributors are sort of free (paid by coins) and you will be more convenient when negotiating with real investors. What I see now is that most crypto projects rely heavily on crypto which is nice for the first stage and hype, but later... Predictability and sustainability are better sounding words.