Loading ...Lost in translation
I was reading an article on Wired.com the other day. The article was discussing the use of “babel fish” and its impending introduction in Iraq as a live transaltion tool. Babel fish is instant translation software which US soldiers are about to put to the test in Iraq.
It works by taking a speech input, for instance “please don’t kill us we are just here fo’ your oil, fool” and translates it to Arabic instantaneously and even speaks it using a computerised voice which i have recently discovered have improved greatly in recent times. This of course translates to “durka durka durka durkastan”.
This got me thinking, would such a tool be useful for online gaming? When we play online games alot of the time we would choose a server, if available, that is predominantly english speaking. Wouldn’t it be great to just choose a server without worrying about the language barrier? Sounds a bit Star Trek but it may be closer than we think?
Read the article here
Thats very interesting indeed. I am a fan of Babel fish (or altavista translation). It could certainly be a toll that gamers could use, as all too often divides form as countries stick together.
Obviously the “i” mericans are going to put some cash into Babel fish to bring it up to the level they need. I find it quite silly from time to time…..Let me explain:
English: “Hello my name is Britney. I like pupy dogs and the united states of “imerica”. I think we should support our president in all things”
Babel fish English - German: “Hallo ist mein Name Britney. Ich mag pupy Hunde und die Vereinigten Staaten von “imerica”. Ich denke, daß wir uns stützen sollten oder Präsident in allen Sachen”
We now take the above and reverse the translation, from German to English with babel fish. It reads:
“Hello is my name Britney. I like pupy dogs and the United States of “imerica”. I think that we should support ourselves or president in all things.”
Not so bad…..but if we were to quibble over semantics…….Not bad but it gets funnier when you feed in more complicated blurb!!
Comment by Justin — November 20, 2005 @ 11:06 pm
That could cause a few American casualties, say for instance “pupy dogs” was wrongly translated as “killing Arabs”, it could happen!
Comment by Phil — November 21, 2005 @ 9:28 pm