Machine Translation: Leave us alone! 

Machine Translation

Machine Translation has been something of a taboo subject among many freelance translators.

“Will they just replace us with machines?”

“Should I start looking for another job?” or, the classic:

“Naaaaaaah, it’s never gonna be good enough for my language combination!”

These questions are understandable and show our anxiety and fear of the future. Over the years translators have had to adapt to a great deal of change in their pattern of work: learning how to use computers, translation memories, desktop publishing, a bit of web design, HTML and the list goes on. But that change had to do with evolving the profession itself and has meant longer working hours and, of course, increased income.

In the case of Machine Translation, though, the very nature of the profession is at stake. The transition from a human operated translation process with TM systems (soon to have a big fat RIP sign on them) to a machine operated and human edited translation has already begun to some extent. We have to accept the fact that large organizations and corporations invest considerable funds in the development of MT, simply because they expect a geometric return on their investment. We, as freelance translators, can’t do much to stop this – so we might as well adapt!

During the current economic crisis, corporations are “forced” to cut down on their translation budgets. This, however, is not accompanied with a relative decrease in the translation volume. Products are still being produced and new content continues to be written. Companies increasingly look to localized content and marketing strategies because nowadays it’s just so difficult to convince the consumer to buy! Hence, this means greater translation volumes but with a reduced budget.

So where does this leave the translator? Do we just slash our rates and say YES to everything? Do we continue to snub all those post editing (machine translated) projects out there? My answer is yes and no and maybe! Things are too volatile at the moment. Endorsing the MT trend will perhaps mean that more content will become available on the translation market.

Maybe translators will be able to handle 2-3 times the volume they can today and, this way, they will be able to approach large corporations directly, without the need for a “middle man” (translation agencies). Imagine a freelancer or a team of freelancers with a daily capacity of 10.000-15.000 words: this will probably make translation more appealing as a service to businesses and, as said before, will open new channels of contact between freelancers and big companies. In conclusion, since we can’t do anything about this, let’s just find ways to see it as an opportunity.