The field of interpreting is currently undergoing what I described in 2018 as a “Technological Turn,” a term highlighting the transformative impact of recent technological advancements on the profession. Until that time, interpreting had experienced relatively limited technological influence compared to other language-related fields, such as written translation. However, emerging developments in remote interpreting, computer-assisted…
Author: claudio
Rethinking Machine Translation: Understanding, Reformulating, and Translating
What if, instead of taking the direct route from one language to another, we applied the principles taught in translation schools to machine translation? Rather than translating words verbatim, we were trained to understand the meaning of a sentence, then reformulate that meaning — not the sentence itself — in the target language, taking into…
Simultaneous Speech Translation: from sentence to context-based approach
Progress is an incremental process—sometimes with big, dramatic leaps, and other times with painstakingly small, almost invisible steps. In speech translation, the ultimate goal is clear: creating a system capable of accurately translating across languages and cultures, capturing not just words but also their intended meaning, while seamlessly adapting to the communicative context. But let’s…
Data Privacy in AI Translation and Interpreting
Data privacy is a critical concern when using services, whether they are provided by humans or machines. There are many valid reasons for this: you may have confidential information that you do not want others to access, such as business strategies, financial data, or personal health details. Or you simply do not want others to…
Agency in AI interpreters
Many people hold a static view of what an AI interpreter is or will be: a tool that translates literally and blindly, no matter how unclear or garbled the original speech is—whether it’s mispronounced, unintelligible, or ambiguous. A mechanical device capable only of direct, word-for-word translations. In other words, a piece of software that will…
What happens when AI can generate podcasts
This was the question I asked myself when I first heard that this was technically possible. So, I had to try it out. I simply provided a link to something I know very well: my work, and watched the results emerge. Here are two podcasts generated by NotebookLM: The first is quite serious and is…
Towards non-discriminatory multilingualism
Last weekend was Multilingualism Day at the European Institutions. This is a great initiative to showcase why multilingualism matters and what institutions do to make it possible “that all EU citizens can follow the work of directly-elected representatives in any of the 24 official EU languages.” While this effort is commendable, a simple reality check…
4 years ago my journey in speech automation started
Four years ago today, my personal journey in the practical implementation of Machine Interpreting started with a simple application -written in a rainy weekend just for fun- which is still available online for free at www.machine-interpreting.com. Try it out if you are curious! Now, commercial speech translation systems are completely different from that first naive…
The Clash of Interpretations
In 1993, Samuel P. Huntington introduced the world to the concept of “The Clash of Civilizations” (article available here) positing that future conflicts would be driven by cultural and religious differences. Fast forward three decades, and we are witnessing the surge of a similar kind of cultural clash—not as important as the one described by…
Enhance Interpreting Training with YouTube
Interpreting training relies on teachers providing students with suitable speeches to practice. Many times, trainers offer background information for preparation and transcripts of the originals for checking the quality of the rendition. The importance of training materials is demonstrated by the so-called repositories of speech curated by international organizations such as the European Union, with…