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General => General Technical Chat => Topic started by: Lightages on May 15, 2016, 04:30:09 am

Title: Is Babelfish finally here?
Post by: Lightages on May 15, 2016, 04:30:09 am
I just saw this. I was wondering why it hasn't been done already. I thought it would have been a logical extension of Google translate on phones.

http://www.waverlylabs.com/#_overview (http://www.waverlylabs.com/#_overview)
Title: Re: Is Babelfish finally here?
Post by: apis on May 15, 2016, 01:14:20 pm
Have you tried the automatic subtitle function in Youtube?

If you try it you will realize why it hasn't been done before, and how well this thing is likely to perform.
Title: Re: Is Babelfish finally here?
Post by: meeder on May 15, 2016, 01:25:41 pm
More Indiegogo crap?
Title: Re: Is Babelfish finally here?
Post by: Aodhan145 on May 15, 2016, 01:27:15 pm
Quote from: apis on May 15, 2016, 01:14:20 pm
Have you tried the automatic subtitle function in Youtube?

If you try it you will realize why it hasn't been done before, and how well this thing is likely to perform.

The subtitle function in Youtube isn't that bad. Except for Dave where it fails completely. It is hilarious to read sometimes.
Title: Re: Is Babelfish finally here?
Post by: apis on May 15, 2016, 01:52:39 pm
Youtube has the Google engineering force and their serverfarms behind it trying to voice-to-text decode studio grade (mostly) audio of a single english speaking voice with little ambient noise, yet it often (always in my experience) fails completely. :)

In theory it could work, and it would be awesome if it did, but not quite there yet.
Title: Re: Is Babelfish finally here?
Post by: SeanB on May 15, 2016, 05:08:52 pm
Auto transcript in Youtube works well if you are a white midwestern US male, but is is either wrong, really wrong, utterly wrong or not even on the same planet with speech from anybody who is outside of the USA midwest or LA. Dave comes in as something else than what he speaks pretty much all of the time, and other english accents get mangled even worse. Haven't looked to see how it would respond to Mike, or to a Scottish or Irish accent, though it often thinks Geordie is Greek.
Title: Re: Is Babelfish finally here?
Post by: Lightages on May 15, 2016, 06:32:04 pm
Yes, google translate sure leaves a lot to be desired still but it is good enough to help in many situations. it is much better than no understanding at all.  I am not trying to promote this waverylabs thing in any way. It smells to much like vaporware still. It would be nice if it does work though.
Title: Re: Is Babelfish finally here?
Post by: German_EE on May 15, 2016, 07:52:13 pm
Well, I just tried Portuguese to English on a Youtube video and got the following line:

'attenuator at zero degrees with the pain will actually fall well this cannot'

I'd say that we have a bit of work to do before the babelfish becomes reality.
Title: Re: Is Babelfish finally here?
Post by: calexanian on May 16, 2016, 02:18:08 am
It does not appear to feed on brain waves, an important virtue of the Babelfish. No disappearing in a poof of logic.

Title: Re: Is Babelfish finally here?
Post by: meeder on May 16, 2016, 11:03:05 am
Or our language may not be advanced enough for the Babelfish to interpret it :)