Once, machine translation was only possible in a galaxy far, far away from Star Trek’s Universal Translator to a fictitious animal that performs instant translations in Hitchhiker's Babel Fish. But now that Microsoft’s Skype translate or enables callers speaking different languages to converse in real-time via machine translation, that science fiction fantasy has become a non-fiction reality.
Google just updated today its translation app for smartphones.
Google now offers written translation of 90 languages and the ability to hear spoken translations and you can now start speaking in a selected language and Google Translate will automatically recognize the languages being spoken.
One big update is also the integration of Word Lens. The Translate app already allowed you to take a picture of text and have it translated into one of 36 languages but you can now get instant translation.
“there is something to be said for having your translator be different – if I speak Chinese, I’d have a woman’s voice, so people know it’s a translation”
You have to be careful about what you do with your voice, in part because of potential issues around biometric security in case voice recognition replaced passwords, if you use such technology.
Also be aware having your your message lost in translation is often comic, but it can also be embarrassing! Ask Pepsi, which, when introducing their product to the Chinese market, used the slogan "Come Alive with the Pepsi Generation", which was translated as "Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the dead"...