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Poll: Do you feel threatened by machine translation?
Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
Yaotl Altan
Yaotl Altan  Identity Verified
Mexico
Local time: 06:05
Member (2006)
English to Spanish
+ ...
Right Nov 22, 2014

Mario Freitas wrote:

I'm sorry some people don't notice it,



Call it a mix of arrogance and ignorance.


but despite the poor quality of the MTs, many people are already using them officially. The Chinese, for example, have no problems translating an operation manual using MT and enclosing it with their product to the entire world.


Yes, Asia will rule economically the XXI century. China (1.357 millions) and India (1,252 millions) represents 37% of world population. If we add Indonesia population we reach 40% and that trend will increase year after year.

As their agencies are using MT, they will not affect translation as a profession, they are already affecting it!

"A German patent to be translated into Spanish? Yes, we can! Call our Beijing agency. Perhaps an invention against ebola to be translated from English into Italian? Yes, we can! Our Mumbay-biased agency works that pair and 183 other pairs too. As a matter of fact, we translate from/to every single language on Earth"


As the MTs become more sophisticated, more people tend to do that.

Another obvious trend is that instead of hiring translators, people are machine translating and hiring proofreaders for half the price.


Yes, the best way to crush our profession.


Of course experienced professionals do not accept these "jobs", but lots of translators do. Many agencies are offering $ 0.04 per source word regularly. Do you think they find translators for that price? Of course they do... many to choose from.


Yes, sadly.


Unfortunately, quality is not as important as money for most companies in the capitalist world. And machine translators are very cheap.


Of course, you won't get a surprise, Mario. You wrote a convincing analysis on MT.
There will be a lot of people, those who consider MT harmless, asking "What happened?" when those 0.04 rates achieve the 0.01 rates.

AINDA MAIS... the very low salaries on India and China let agencies on those countries to quickly enrich by damaging translation.



[Modifié le 2014-11-22 22:22 GMT]
 
José Henrique Lamensdorf
José Henrique Lamensdorf  Identity Verified
Brazil
Local time: 09:05
English to Portuguese
+ ...
In memoriam
My forecast goes beyond that Nov 22, 2014

Yaotl Altan wrote:

There will be a lot of people, those who consider MT harmless, asking "What happened?" when those 0.04 rates achieve the 0.01 rates.

AINDA MAIS... the very low salaries on India and China let agencies on those countries to quickly enrich by damaging translation.


My prediction is that translation (at least in my pair, EN-PT) at 0.05 and below will gradually go to 0.00, thanks to MT. Meanwhile translation rates above 0.06 - and worth it - will hold, and perhaps go up a bit on the upper end (highly specialized).

The point about agencies in India and China is that many of them impose translation rates based on their domestic salaries, worldwide. Amateur "tranzlaters" worldwide are eager to accept these, as a bag of peanuts is better than no peanuts at all.

However they can't do it that way when the end-client demands high quality professional translation. So these bottom feeding agencies will either have to seek some other endeavor, or find clients (viz. patsies) willing to pay for free machine translation available online. Cheap, low quality "tranzlaters" will have to change to some other occupation where they perform better, deliver better results.

IMO this "cleansing effect" should be good for the entire professional translation industry, getting it rid from cheap amateurs who think they can wing it and pull the wool over their clients' eyes.

Truly professional translators in India and China? They'll eventually get paid like translators anywhere else, and live like kings there, their spending possibly favoring the local economy to some extent on the long run.
 
Helen Hagon
Helen Hagon  Identity Verified
Local time: 13:05
Russian to English
+ ...
Not really Nov 22, 2014

I don't feel threatened by machine translation itself. The advance of technology is inevitable and there is a place for machine translation in certain areas. However I do feel threatened by those customers who think that machine translation is the same as human translation, only cheaper. In my opinion the two serve very different purposes.
 
Muriel Vasconcellos (X)
Muriel Vasconcellos (X)  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 05:05
Spanish to English
+ ...
Definitely not Nov 24, 2014

I have postedited one of the best machine translation systems off and on since 1980. MT has improved, but it still has a long way to go. People quickly realize its limitations.

Thirty years ago language experts moaned that MT would lower the quality of language and that has not happened. The innovation most likely to lower the quality of language is *texting*.
 
Mario Freitas
Mario Freitas  Identity Verified
Brazil
Local time: 09:05
Member (2014)
English to Portuguese
+ ...
I'm gald to know I'm not alone here! Thank you. Nov 27, 2014

Yaotl Altan wrote:

Mario Freitas wrote:

I'm sorry some people don't notice it,



Call it a mix of arrogance and ignorance.


but despite the poor quality of the MTs, many people are already using them officially. The Chinese, for example, have no problems translating an operation manual using MT and enclosing it with their product to the entire world.


Yes, Asia will rule economically the XXI century. China (1.357 millions) and India (1,252 millions) represents 37% of world population. If we add Indonesia population we reach 40% and that trend will increase year after year.

As their agencies are using MT, they will not affect translation as a profession, they are already affecting it!

"A German patent to be translated into Spanish? Yes, we can! Call our Beijing agency. Perhaps an invention against ebola to be translated from English into Italian? Yes, we can! Our Mumbay-biased agency works that pair and 183 other pairs too. As a matter of fact, we translate from/to every single language on Earth"


As the MTs become more sophisticated, more people tend to do that.

Another obvious trend is that instead of hiring translators, people are machine translating and hiring proofreaders for half the price.


Yes, the best way to crush our profession.


Of course experienced professionals do not accept these "jobs", but lots of translators do. Many agencies are offering $ 0.04 per source word regularly. Do you think they find translators for that price? Of course they do... many to choose from.


Yes, sadly.


Unfortunately, quality is not as important as money for most companies in the capitalist world. And machine translators are very cheap.


Of course, you won't get a surprise, Mario. You wrote a convincing analysis on MT.
There will be a lot of people, those who consider MT harmless, asking "What happened?" when those 0.04 rates achieve the 0.01 rates.

AINDA MAIS... the very low salaries on India and China let agencies on those countries to quickly enrich by damaging translation.



[Modifié le 2014-11-22 22:22 GMT]


 
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Poll: Do you feel threatened by machine translation?






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