Article contest-Winner interview

Interview with Michael Bailey, winner of the translation article contest

Hello Michael. First of all, thank you for taking part in our article contest. Please tell us something about yourself and what motivated you to take part in the contest:

A: You're welcome. I like to do what I can, you know, to give a little something back to the community and whatnot. Personally, I was motivated by the $150 that was offered to the winner. Also, I like languages and translation and stuff, too.

What do you think about our article section and what kind of articles do you read most?

A: I think the article section is great. I appreciate the informative, educational-type articles, but I love the humorous ones the most. Peanut Jackson is actually one of my favorite contemporary literary figures.

What do you use the articles for? (e.g. Are they useful for your daily work as a translator?)

A: A lot of them are useful, definitely. Like the ones about dealing with project managers, and the ones offering hints and tips for freelance translators. I've saved a lot of money and time utilizing some of the advice in those articles.

Is there anything you'd like to read more about?

A: As I said earlier, I like that Peanut Jackson guy and would like to read more about him. He should have his own section, seriously. He's a funny guy.

Why did you write about machine translation?

A: It was something that I'd been thinking about for awhile, and a subject that I believe warrants a good amount of discussion, especially in a venue like YakuYaku, where freelance translators, professional translators, and project managers can all convene and converse.

Besides the negative effects of the advent of machine translation, do you believe that positive opportunities could also from it? Maybe even opportunities for translators?

A: Most of the current machine translation software is based on "to English" systems, which means that the source language is first translated into English, and into the desired language afterward. As I stated in my article, for languages which similar grammar or words, the translation you receive can be pretty good. But for non-related languages it is far from being perfect. Because of this, I believe that more widespread use of machine translation could in fact actually provide more opportunities for translators as well, in that the people and companies using these translation engines are going to need *someone* to clean up the final product properly.

Do you think a direct translation system might change that? From your point of view as a translator, what do you think is still necessary to have a direct machine translation running?

A: I think that by far the number one most important resource to have in translation is - and always will be - a human translator. Regardless of how "perfect" machine translation becomes, the fact remains that there will always be certain nuances, implications, and ideas that simply cannot be "understood" by a computer, and therefore cannot be conveyed 100% accurately without human intelligence and guidance.

What kind of personal skills are necessary for translation - something a machine can never achieve?

A: Gratitude, appreciation, and the ability to "read between the lines", so to speak.

In your article, you mention something interesting: the next step of automatic translation is "Automatic Interpretation", like Star Trek's "Universal Translator". That is really entering into the realm of fanciful imagination. Before we reach that point, what do you think will happen? Do you think there might be any sort of hybrid model?

A: Well, with the progression of both machine translation and speech-to-text - and, conversely, text-to-speech - technology, I believe that we could have an extremely primitive and basic version of that sort of device any day now. Of course, it would greatly inhibit the act of actual conversation, but it would at least be something interesting from which we could learn and with which we could toy around with a bit.

Despite the threatening aspects of machine translation, how do you see your personal future or the future of the coming generation regarding translation?

A: Since the entire world is going to end in 2012, I haven't really given the matter much thought. Just kidding. Seriously though, to be honest, I'm not so worried. As long as you apply yourself, keep your skills sharp, and keep in touch with current technologies and the flow of the industry/market, I think human translators will be OK.

If we were to run another article contest or another YakuYaku event, would you participate again? And for the article contest, what topic would you like to write about next time?

A: I'd totally participate again, especially if I have the chance to score another 150 bones. As for the topic of my article, I was thinking either "Crayon + .PDF = Masterpiece", or maybe something along the lines of "Peanut Jackson for President".

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