Transcription Archives

We’re not your mother’s transcription service

As we talked about earlier this month, the cassette tapes and reels are just about gone. Typewriters, of course, have all but completely disappeared (although we do keep one in the backroom just in case of all-out digital failure/crash, call us prepared/paranoid). And don’t even get Sandy, our very old president, started about the ol’ cylinder Dictaphones…

SO WHAT’S THE DIFF?

But it’s not just the difference in technology that separates the Audio Transcription Center from the transcription services of yore (mother’s days). It’s our attitude towards the business and our firm belief that we are only as good as the people we employ.

We strive to be more than just an office where an army of anonymous typists sit and click out transcripts day after day in stuffy cubicles.

Sure, we have a large staff (100 plus!) who all can type a minimum of 75 WPM, and who seem to work tirelessly at our 15 workstations, 24/7/365. And, okay, there might be some cubicle-esque work areas here… but that’s where the similarities end.

A PLACE FOR BRAINIACS

But what we continually take pride in is that all of our staff members have so much more to offer than just speed, accuracy, and efficiency. They’re brainiacs, to be honest. At any given time, we employ some of the best and brightest transcriptionists with degrees ranging from BAs, to JD, to PhDs. To use a classic Sandy-ism, “Since when do Boston’s PhDs have to give up eating?”

Not only do our transcriptionists come to us well-educated (and usually hungry), they also come from a myriad of social and ethnic backgrounds with knowledge sets ranging from science and tech, to popular culture, to art history, to finance, to law, and more.

Working with this large and diverse pool of knowledge and talent allows us to custom match transcription projects to just the right person (or people) for the job.

Add that all together with our ability to handle pretty much any audio file, our streamlined work flow and digital workstations, and that’s what gives us the confidence to offer:

Incredibly fast (like blazing) project turnaround
100% Quality Guarantee (or your money back)
Rush service at no extra charge (ever!)

WHAT ARE YOU, LIKE SUPERHEROES OR SOMETHING?

Well, when it comes to transcription at least. And we certainly think we’d all look pretty sharp in capes…

Inside ATC

New Name. New Website. TTC is now ATC.

The times they have a-changed…

And so have our clients’ needs…

And so have we…

The Tape Transcription Center is now…

here it comes…

…

….

…..

….

…

the AUDIO TRANSCRIPTION CENTER!

For over 40 (32 of which have been in this lovely building across from Boston Common) years we’ve done business under the Tape Transcription banner, a name that aptly described what was once our basic service. But the fact is, in 2010, with the world almost completely digitally revolutionized, we now work with audio (and even video!) formats no one had even dreamed of back when Sandy Poritzky set up shop in 1966.

Tapes? What the hell happened to tapes?

MP3? WAV? DSS? AVI? As technology has evolved and grown exponentially over the last decade, so have audio formats, the way we receive and transcribe them, and how we return completed work back to our clients.

Just five years ago, roughly 80% of our work came in on analog tapes. Flash forward to the present, and we have nearly 96% of the audio we transcribe coming to us in digital formats, most of it uploaded to us directly. No postage fees, no waiting for delivery to start a job, no chance of loss or damage during shipment. In turn, our already supernatural ability to meet or beat tight turnaround times has been upped by a full 40%.

But still, sometimes we almost kind of miss the holiday-like excitement of opening all of those big, clunky packages stuffed with reels or cassettes. Almost. In fact, Sandy still buys lunch for the office to commemorate the anniversary of the day we received over 400 oral history cassettes in one delivery.

Audio instead of Tapes. Got it.

But how will I find you on the vast World Wide Web?

So glad you asked! In conjunction with the change to a new name, we are excited to announce the launch of our snazzily revamped website at a brand new URL: http://www.audiotranscriptioncenter.com/
But what about all the good stuff TTC always offered?

Sure, our name has changed, but the way we approach our business hasn’t.

Our stock and trade is still the largest team of highly educated, culturally diverse and intellectually curious transcriptionists of any service, anywhere.

We still specialize in beating unreasonable deadlines.

We still never charge extra for rush jobs.

And of course, we still transcribe from tapes.

What hasn’t changed is probably best summed up by this email Patrick received from a client just last week:

“Thank you for being so great and accommodating. We refer people to you all the time, particularly since you’ve been so good about dealing with our craziness.”

We still thrive on craziness.

Client Spotlight, Transcription

February 2010 Client Spotlight

February 2010 Client Spotlight - Atc Blog

As one of the largest transcription service providers for historians, academics, and researchers from across the nation, we have the pleasure of being some of the first ears and eyes to handle diverse and extremely exciting source material.

Hardly a day goes by where the team here at The Tape Transcription Center isn’t amazed or excited (or even inspired!) by the projects that come through our humble office here on the Common.

Now, we’ve decided to take the opportunity with our blog to initiate a monthly spotlight on some of our fascinating clients and their work.* Right at the top of our list of people-and-projects-we-want-to-tell-the-world-about-via-the-internet is Peniel E. Joseph and his pioneering work on the history of the Black Power movement in America.

A Professor of History at Tufts University, Dr. Joseph is a pioneer in the field of “Black Power Studies,” and a frequent commentator who’s appeared on NPR, PBS’s Newshour, and C-SPAN.

Dr. Joseph became one of our clients when he was an Assistant Professor at SUNY-Stony Brook and was working on what would become his critically acclaimed, award-winning non-fiction book, “Waiting ‘Til the Midnight Hour: A History of Black Power in America.”

He has served on the faculty at Brandeis and is currently a tenured professor at Tufts. His latest book, “Dark Days, Bright Nights: From Black Power to Barack Obama,” hit the shelves this past January.

Currently, Dr. Joseph is in the process of working on a new book focusing specifically on the controversial Civil Rights activist Stokely Carmichael, a.k.a. Kwame Ture.

*Caveat: As excited as we may be about the work we do here, privacy is absolutely essential for many of our clients. Therefore, we will only feature clients whose work is already shared with the public and who have given us express prior permission.

FAQ, Transcription

Why Transcription?

Why transcription - ATC Blog

Over and over I read posts on online, and time and again the questions come up, why transcription? You read this and think, well surely you’ll tell me why, you’re a transcription company. Well, yeah we are, (www.ttctranscriptions.com – yes, a shameless plug, but I’ve got 3 kids to feed) but I digress and assure you it’s a lot deeper than that.

In our office, we see a wide range of diverse projects that flow through, and the transcriptions range from: oral history, personal history, archival, legal, academic, market research, financial, and surely the list goes on.

In the legal world, transcripts have been known to be an important resource for all parties, a document to easily read the depositions, examinations, and so on. People on both sides of the courtroom utilize the transcript to make sure no lies are being stated by anyone (there’s a lie)…well, possibly to catch people in those lies.

Why transcription? Well, think about this question. How “searchable” is your audio? Say you’re an Oral Historian, and you’ve just conducted hours of interviews with someone. The last thing you want to do is to go back and listen to all of these hours of audio. Through a transcript, you can easily read specific sections of text, copy and paste, and move on to the next part of text you require.

For more information on transcription, check out some listservs, and see what others are saying. SAA (Society of American Archivists), OHA (Oral History Association), and APH (Association of Personal Historians, though you have to be a paid member of APH to be on the listserv) are some great listservs to check out. As always you may contact us, The Tape Transcription Center, and find out more about how a transcript is able to help you!

The Tape Transcription Center
www.ttctranscriptions.com
617-423-2151
Never a charge for RUSH service, never!