A ‘Shocking’ Amount of the Web Is Already AI-Translated Trash, Scientists Determine::Researchers warn that most of the text we view online has been poorly translated into one or more languages—usually by a machine.

  • Shazbot@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    As someone who has spent their life translating for family this isn’t surprising. Nor is it any easier when they bring me poorly translated documents and hope I decipher machine diarrhea. The tech is still years behind being real world ready, especially with anything above 6th grade grammar and nuanced word choice that depends on context and sometimes dialect. But free is free so 🤷

    • abhibeckert@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      But free is free so 🤷

      The free ones suck but some of the paid ones are pretty good.

      I was recently tasked with translating an auto-biography a 90 year old relative wrote, and the results were really good. I don’t speak their language very well, and they don’t speak mine very well either. I was quoted $10,000 by a professional human translation service.

      OpenAI, for comparison, would charge about five bucks with their most expensive model. And the results are a lot better than a free translation. Is it better than a human? No - but it’s pretty close.