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Microsoft Demos Real-Time Translation Over Skype

Posted by samzenpus on from the speaking-the-same-language dept.

Z80xxc! (1111479) writes "Today at the first annual Code Conference, Microsoft demonstrated its new real-time translation in Skype publicly for the first time. Gurdeep Pall, Microsoft's VP of Skype and Lync, compares the technology to Star Trek's Universal Translator. During the demonstration, Pall converses in English with a coworker in Germany who is speaking German. 'Skype Translator results from decades of work by the industry, years of work by our researchers, and now is being developed jointly by the Skype and Microsoft Translator teams. The demo showed near real-time audio translation from English to German and vice versa, combining Skype voice and IM technologies with Microsoft Translator, and neural network-based speech recognition.'"

7 of 169 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Watch the whole thing, because... by danknight48 · · Score: 3, Funny

    MyCleanPC

    Clearly doesnt work. Since your ./ account has been compromised and your now spamming like a bot.

  2. Re:English to German is relatively easy by Mordok-DestroyerOfWo · · Score: 5, Funny

    I'd be happy with English to Texas English for when I have to deal with my family in the South.

    --
    "Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right" - Salvor Hardin
  3. Re:Classic joke.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny

    Also, how the fuck did that fuckhead spammer BillTheEngineer get to post zillions of copies of his spam, all at 16:04, while us regular users have to wait 5 minutes?

    And yet it seems strangely appropriate to find the spam on a thread about a Microsoft product.

  4. Men are from Mars.... by HockeyPuck · · Score: 3, Funny

    Now if this device could tell me what my wife is saying....

    1. Re:Men are from Mars.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      Reminds me of an old joke:

      A guy was walking along the beach, found a bottle, and picked it up. A magical genie popped out and said, "Thanks for letting me out. For your kindness I will grant you one wish." The guy said, "I've always wanted to go to Hawaii, but I can't because I'm afraid to fly and ships make me deathly sick. My wish is for you to build a highway from here to Hawaii." The genie replied, "I'm sorry, but I don't think I can do that. Just think of all the work involved. Think of the huge pilings we would need to hold up that highway and how deep they would have to be to reach the bottom of the ocean. And think of all the cement that would be needed. Plus, since it's such a long span, there would have to be gas stations and rest stops along the way. No, that's just too much to ask. Impossible. Think of another wish." The guy thought for a moment and said, "Well, there is one thing I've always wanted to know. I'd like to be able to understand women - what makes them laugh and cry, why are they so temperamental, why are they so difficult to get along with ...you know, what makes them tick?" The genie thought for a second, then asked, "Do you want that highway with two lanes or four?"

  5. Re:Classic joke.. by master_kaos · · Score: 2, Funny

    [quote]Also, how the fuck did that fuckhead spammer BillTheEngineer get to post zillions of copies of his spam, all at 16:04, while us regular users have to wait 5 minutes?[/quote]
    He actually posted it in 20 different languages but Skype automatically translated them all to English for us...

  6. Re:Classic joke.. by CRCulver · · Score: 3, Funny

    You picked the wrong fellow to be pedantic with, my good man. In Classical Greek, myriados was both a numeral "10,000" and an adjective "countless". As a glance at the OED entry for the word will show, both senses passed into English when it borrowed the word.