AI in, freelancers out Autor de la hebra: Peter Motte
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Peter Motte 
Bélgica
Local time: 17:29
Miembro 2009
inglés al neerlandés
+ ...
I just wonder: would the advent of Gen AI translations mean that the independent translators will be pushed out of the market, because compagnies will do more in-house?
| | | | Lingua 5B
Bosnia y Herzegovina
Local time: 17:29
Miembro 2009
inglés al croata
+ ...
I kind of saw an increase in direct client inquiries, for translation (I don’t do PE, proofreading or editing).
If many agencies go out of business, and direct clients require human approach (even just ocassionally), then their only way will be to contact us directly.
| | | | Zea_Mays
Italia
Local time: 17:29
inglés al alemán
+ ...
Peter Motte wrote:
I just wonder: would the advent of Gen AI translations mean that the independent translators will be pushed out of the market, because compagnies will do more in-house?
From what I am observing, a few big companies (not agencies) are experimenting with inhouse MT and LLM editing, meaning that a bot like ChatGPT does the first editing. This also means they need larger teams dedicated to this.
Since the machines are not perfect (and LLMs tend to allucinate), a final proofreading step is still required, which would be outsourced to agencies.
But as said, it's something only large companies can do, as they have the liquidity to afford the costs of training and using LLMs.
| | | | Dan Lucas
Reino Unido
Local time: 16:29
Miembro 2014
japonés al inglés
| Is it what they do best? | Oct 14, 2024 |
I haven't thought this through in detail, but I don't think the use of generative AI or MT necessarily means that such work will be taken in-house to a greater degree than has hitherto been the case.
It seems to me that there is a tendency for people tend to forget that the trend of the past thirty or forty years has been away from diversification and towards core competencies.
If you are good at designing semiconductors, or operating a heavy equipment leasing business,... See more I haven't thought this through in detail, but I don't think the use of generative AI or MT necessarily means that such work will be taken in-house to a greater degree than has hitherto been the case.
It seems to me that there is a tendency for people tend to forget that the trend of the past thirty or forty years has been away from diversification and towards core competencies.
If you are good at designing semiconductors, or operating a heavy equipment leasing business, or running a hospital, it is unlikely that you will also be competent at running a translation business.
If you have a certain level of internal demand, yes, it may appear to be cheaper to fulfill that in-house, but whether it is an efficient use of the resources that you devote to translation or not is a different matter.
To put it differently, if you invest (say) $2,000,000 in running a small translation department every year, what is the return you get on that? Is it more or less than you would get from investing $2,000,000 in your main business? It is unlikely to be "more" unless your main business is moribund.
That, in a nutshell, is why companies of a certain size outsource so many services and functions. They look at the activities in which they are involved and ask themselves whether that activity is really an area in which they have a competitive advantage. Most companies have competitive advantages only in tightly defined areas of business.
Companies with high levels of internal bureaucracy tend not to pursue this approach (Japanese companies have traditionally been of this type, though that is changing). This is because turkeys don't vote for Christmas, and voting for greater efficiency in a bureaucratic corporation might mean voting yourself out of a job.
I can't see any obvious reason why use of LLMs and other generative AIs would necessarily lead to more in-house business, especially when one considers that these are areas in which traditional translators (such as those working for an existing in-house team) are unlikely to have any special competence. Really you'd want people with both linguistic skills and IT skills, and specifically AI skills, and the latter are in high demand and short supply. So the cost rises even more...
So who does perform the translations? Agencies at the top end with good IT skills?
Regards,
Dan ▲ Collapse
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Lieven Malaise
Bélgica
Local time: 17:29
Miembro 2020
francés al neerlandés
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Let's not forget that we are coming from an era in which every big company or bank or whatever large institution had its own translation department, staffed by more than one person by the way. There is a reason why they shifted away from that approach: outsoursing it is simply cheaper and I see no reason why it would no longer be cheaper in the AI era.
The only thing I see happening is that more companies will "impose" cheaper MT translations (or AI translations but, people, ChatGPT... See more Let's not forget that we are coming from an era in which every big company or bank or whatever large institution had its own translation department, staffed by more than one person by the way. There is a reason why they shifted away from that approach: outsoursing it is simply cheaper and I see no reason why it would no longer be cheaper in the AI era.
The only thing I see happening is that more companies will "impose" cheaper MT translations (or AI translations but, people, ChatGPT and the like really aren't as fit for translation purposes as MT is) on translation agencies, but I actually believe this is already happening right now, so that wouldn't be new or shocking. ▲ Collapse
| | | | David GAY
Local time: 17:29
inglés al francés
+ ...
Another possibility would be to use interns... Easy and cheap
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