The next wave, already upon us: Artificial intelligence
In 2023, the scramble is on to incorporate artificial intelligence (AI) wherever possible. Machine translation (MT) options have already made their way into many or most CAT tools, as advances in MT and translator adoption of its benefits increase. But with the sudden popularization of Large Language Models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT, Bard, Claude, and others, AI may have already come to a CAT tool you own too, and if it has not, it most likely will soon.
Some people have asked, “What’s the fuss?” or “What’s the rush?”
Well, let’s put aside the fact that it’s become fashionable to talk about AI and try to include it wherever possible. Let’s look just at the work of the translator. Already, translators have found ways to leverage LLMs for some tasks, and are finding ways to become more efficient, not just while translating or transcreating, but also at tasks around translation (research, communication, content creation, negotiation, glossary generation, etc.). Machine translation use among translators developed in a very similar way, as did CAT tool adoption before that. But what is different here is the speed at which everything is happening, and the speed at which the technology is improving. Where CAT tool and then MT use or adoption might have been better measured on a yearly basis, LLM use/adoption is moving notably on a monthly basis (at least for now!). With MT, it has usually been the translator who is more in the know about the ins and outs of the technology, and what it is good for, and they have already built up that experience and knowledge by the time their clients start asking about it. You probably want to be in a similar position when it comes to LLMs and AI applied to translation. And if there are concrete ways in which using this technology can make you more efficient, and leave you more time to do the stuff that really requires a human brain and expertise, which is the part of translation that many people enjoy most, why not?
This report would have been finished a couple of months earlier if I had let ChatGPT
write a first draft, I’m sure. But some old habits die hard.
This post comes from CAT tools 2023: an industry report. ProZ.com industry reports can be found at https://www.proz.com/industry-report/ . ProZ.com paying members receive immediate, full access to the information available in industry reports, which are about and for freelance language professionals.
