Do you need translation services? Learn the advantages of machine translation; why human translators will continue to play a core role in translation.
The translation is an important tool of communication for businesses or companies and their clients. With diverse languages all over the world, the interaction between organizations or countries is made easier.
Such diversity has made businesses to be more innovative to reach as many customers as possible. This means that a product may be originally from China, but even customers from the U.S. can use it. The product details will be translated for the customers in the U.S. so that they understand it and its usage.
One of the common methods of translation is through freelancers or companies which offer translation services. onetheless, for the past decade, automated translation platforms have emerged, and they are becoming popular by the day. Companies that offer translation service online use machine translation to assist business entities in widening their market in foreign countries.
Automated translation has evolved with more precise programs that enable the translation systems to learn more words.
This has been caused by the extreme transformation in technology with numerous companies using machine learning and artificial intelligence to improve customer experience and satisfaction.
Some online platforms are evolutionizing the way information is passed and enhancing global interaction. Is this a threat to human translators and linguists? Before we answer the question, let us look at the advantages of automated translation.
Advantages of Automated Translation
The advancement of technology has made life convenient and easy for many companies Machine translation is hugely useful to translate texts from one language to another. So, what are the advantages of automated translation?
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Time-saving: Time is a very crucial factor. When you have an urgent project, automated translation can save the day. You will not need to spend hours perusing dictionaries to translate the text. Instead, the program can translate the words swiftly.
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Affordable: Automated translation is cheaper compared to human translation. If you seek the service of an expert translator, he/she will charge you according to the number of pages being translated, which is costly. In case you are short of budget due to some reasons, you can find lots of free online translator services on the web. Although the end result will need human intervention, however, up to a great extent the results of such services are satisfactory.
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Privacy: Automated translation will keep your data confidential. If you have sensitive data, a human translator may not guarantee the privacy needed with such information. Your data is secure with automated translation.
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Variety: Robotic translation is designed to translate multiple languages while an expert translator specializes in one or two languages.
Assessing Automated Translation Platforms
Lately, online translation tools have developed to satisfactory levels of proficiency. Additionally, there are free online platforms like Google Translate, which had improved tremendously since 2016, when Google innovated a new translation engine termed Google Neural Machine Translation (GNMT).
This new version of translation is capable of translating wide-ranging sentences through an artificial neural system. The neural network is linked with enormous volumes of human-translated words, and it handles long and complete sentences better than earlier versions. Nonetheless, the number of languages that can be translated using the new GNMT is limited.
The system commenced by translating about eight European languages to and from English before extending to Arabic, Chinese, Russian, Hebrew, Vietnamese, and later to nine other Indian languages. The list of languages can still be advanced.
5 Reasons Why Machine Translations Will Never Fully Replace Humans
Automated translation platforms and machines are substituting people at different work stations. Nevertheless, it’s not certain that machines will entirely replace human translators. Let us look at some evident reasons why human translators will still play an integral role in the marketing and translation industry.
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Machines do not comprehend a culture
Machines can’t understand and distinguish idioms, slang, or cultural names. While this will be a crucial challenge for automated translation systems, native speakers with vast experience in languages will remain suitable to understand slang and idioms that a specific culture offers.
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Ability to relate words to the text
Different languages have words with dual meanings. This could be a major problem for automated translation systems. Such words must be translated and related to the context to help define their accurate meanings. Only a native speaker and translator can perfectly relate the words.
For instance, a word such as “tears” in English could mean holes on a garment or the act of tearing something. It could also refer to the tears shed by a depressed person. The machine translator cannot know the right meaning from the context.
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Localizing machines is difficult
New phrases develop in different languages depending on the dialect. Automated translators cannot pick the improved changes in a language as quick as humans who specialize in localization and diverse dialects.
While machines are updated regularly, new words and new contexts will not wait for the updates. It may take time and considerable effort to achieve the desired results. What if you don’t get a suitable translation for a specific phrase?
Style and tone
Quite honestly, capturing the style and tone of a text is preserved by human translators. The textay be poetic, comic, or persuasive in style and tone, but when translated in automated platforms, the intrinsic details may not come out correctly. Only humans can replicate the tone and style.
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Automation still needs a human touch
Translation programs are usually fed with human-translated text and developed by using artificial intelligence. While machine translators are advancing to become more efficient, humans still play a crucial role in ensuring that robotic translations work proficiently.
In conclusion, as businesses continue to grow, using automated translation may be an efficient and time-saving method. Selling products and services in diverse languages offers a great opportunity for growth in the market. While machine translation makes the work easier, a human could be needed to read and revise the final work.
Consequently, neural translation systems can never wholly substitute human translators any time soon.
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