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Microsoft Demos Real-Time Translation Over Skype
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.'"
Back when I was about ten years old (1971) I asked my grandfather, "When you were my age did you imagine computers and men on the moon?"
He replied, "Brian, when I was your age someone told me about radio, with people talking to each other across the ocean without wires. I didn't believe them."
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
It's impressive but relatively speaking, still easy. Now if they can do English to Japanese and vice versa, that would be taking it to 11.
The NSA must really love this feature. They can view any encrypted conversation held via skype AND it gets translated automagically for them? Amazing!
This is just a cover for why Microsoft needs to add Text-to-Speech to the Skype binary. The real purpose is to forward the discussions to the NSA.
I ran MyCleanPC and my computer turned chartreuse did a backflip off the table and spewed starlings all around the room. Just saying'.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.