More details on my work, quality approach, and MPP's teamwork facilities on MPP's website:
MPP Europe Important note for outsourcers:

Currently, the Proz.com engine seems not to filter out job proposals that are as per suggested rates (well under the poverty line) and working conditions (impossible deadlines) nothing but indecent - not only an insult to our profession, but also highly damaging for the image of the translation industry as a whole.

Personally, I am not yet ready to sign a petition distributed by angered colleagues (for information, see Petition, signed by more than 800 colleagues before it closed), because many outsourcers are as professional and in good stead as the translators they're looking for (and from them, I get work), but I'd think that more members should use their influence to change Proz.com's policy in these matters.

After all, most of us endorse Proz.com's professional guidelines. These guidelines make it impossible to work under conditions that should be rejected by the Proz.com engine a limine.

Possible points to explore (just a start):

- Draw up professional guidelines for outsourcers and make them endorse them. Guidelines should address rate, deadline, payment & source text quality issues.
- Encourage outsourcers to make their job descriptions as complete as possible by introducing a standard model including volume, minimum/maximum rates, more detailed description of content.
- Benchmark the descriptions on a scale from (e. g.) 1 to 5 (similarly to the profile rating percentage already in place).
- Implement filters for translation providers to weed out unwanted offers (bad or absent wwa ratings, indecent rates, unrealistic deadlines, no endorsement of guidelines, responsiveness to service offers, poor job description benchmarks).

To summarize: Indecent outsourcers shouldn't be able to hit the job proposal button, or at least get a mild electrical discharge when they do. And Proz.com must commit to do more for a better image of their members.

Wishful thinking? Maybe. Meanwhile, you all can do something by giving individual feedback to your clients on indecent outsourcers. And you might also want to join existing discussion/action groups or create your own with other motivated colleagues. Unfortunately the discussion group mentioned here before, United Translators, has folded for unknown reasons after only two weeks of existence. Proz.com made an official declaration on the forenamed petition site (and now also here) that they will look into the issues and come back with an answer rather soon.

(Last update: March 29, 2010)