On the embargo list

Recently, I was going to translate an amazing book of Mitch Tulloch (the author of Microsoft Encyclopedia of Networking) into Persian. He told me that the permission of the localization of the book belongs to the publisher, hence, the Microsoft Press. I contacted three other persons in MS Press and finally…

Since I reside in a country “on the embargo list” or the book is going to be used in such a country, they cannot license the right for localizing the book! They also asked me to take the site down (the site that hosts the portion I already translated in my spare time) immediately until it gets resolved.

Well, I started translating the content into Persian two years ago, however, I stopped the project (after translating 5 pages or so) just to ask the permission of the author and specifically, the Microsoft Press. Since I believed that Mitch and too many other people involving the publication of the book have put an enormous effort to publish such a reference. By asking their permission, I believed that I will value those efforts.

However, I do now understand why people “on the embargo list” do the translation without asking the publication’s permission. They’d probably never ever be granted to localize a book, since they are residing in a country “on the embargo list”.

In 21st century, who the heck cares about an author’s physical location? We got virtual networks, virtual offices, virtual realities, virtual libraries, virtual PCs, virtual campus and the like. Maybe it’s time to introduce the next virtual term, the “virtual press”.

The bottom line. I won’t localize the book. What a pity!