I have mentioned MT (machine translation) a few times on this blog (e.g. here and here) already, and it will most likely continue to be a topic now and again, seeing as it is not going to disappear. Personally, I am not entirely sure whether it is a positive or a negative development, but regardless, sticking my head in the sand and trying to ignore it won’t help.
MT has long since ceased to be experimental or a fringe phenomenon, so we as translators have to find a way to live with or at least alongside it.

For the most part, the discourse on the translator side is rather gloomy and pessimistic. So I was very pleasantly surprised to come across this positive article on the topic by Silvio Picinini on slator.com.

(c) kparkerdesign

He likens translators to doctors and goes on to say that there is plenty of work for everyone – in their chosen specialties!
And that has been my mantra for years, and not only for my students.
A growing market and growing demand means that even with MT to take care of a certain share, there will still be more than enough work left for real human translation.
Being afraid of MT is therefore not the right response!

Read the entire article here, and then join me as we stroll down the orange carpet!