TMs, augmented translation, and machine translation—they all
have the same goal: replace humans, who are an expense, with an automatic
solution which can reduce or even eliminate the need to pay people.
Interestingly enough, these economic concerns are the same
reasons companies try to replace experienced project managers with interns.
This is the flow of the industry. TM tools, after all, are meant
to enable a company to discount linguists’ work. Linguists even have to pay for
this discount by buying the TM tool (in most cases).
Underpinning this is the idea that technology can replicate the
work of a specialist linguist so that they can be replaced with a cheaper (or
free) generalist. It means one can swap one linguist for another because this
technology assists their word choices (although “correct” translation is a lot
more than proper word choices and the assist from technology often does not
lead to better translation—we pointed this out and coined the “over reverence phenomenon” years ago).
The possible savings are a tempting thing for the C-level folk in
localization companies—imagine the cost reduction—and profit increase—if one did
not have to pay so much to those pesky translators!
However, the clarion call from production is the same—the need
for individual experts and individual subject specialists. Only these human
beings can adapt the style and substance to a certain client.
The needs from clients also are clear. They need competent project
managers to sort out the mid-project changes that are inevitably part of any
project. Harried interns are rarely about rise above hectoring in their efforts
to force linguists to adhere to tightened deadlines or other changes.
So this demonstrates the long-standing chasm between top management
and the trenches where the work is done. More and more systems with little to
show for it, but more bureaucracy…
