The problem is that the AI doesn’t understand cultural context. I dunno where you’re from so pardon me for assuming you’re likely an English speaker.

A good translation isn’t just to translate what the text says but to communicate the same idea to the reader or viewer within their cultural context. A good example is Disney’s Aladdin where Robin Williams improvised A LOT during the recording sessions and most of his jokes are full of contemporary American cultural context. I’m Danish and most Danish kids didn’t understand these American jokes so our translators decided to switch out some jokes with other jokes that conveyed similar points but within a Danish cultural context.

An AI cannot do that. It will translate what is written and it will be fucking nonsense to the receiver because they don’t understand the context or the references.

AI is only good at translating as long as what is written can be translated 1:1. And even then I sometimes wonder. Because as a Dane I have noticed how terrible Word is at Danish when it comes to corrections. It follows English language context and will underline correct words in red and suggest alternative that aren’t real Danish. For example, Danish words are slammed together while in English they are separated = skolelærer - school teacher. Word could very well decide to red line skolelærer and suggest to you that you should separate the word and make it two = skole lærer. But in Danish that would nullify the meaning. Now it is no longer a school teacher but a school and a teacher.

And I have seen on streaming services like Netflix and on steam how they lazily threw descriptions into a translator and it is just the most broken Danish I have ever read. It is so fucked because the newer generations of Danes who use these services are being influenced by them to learn incorrect Danish.

I have very limited trust in AI to do a better job at it since it isn’t Danish people that have trained it and it doesn’t understand our culture, our history nor how we communicate with one another. Everything that comes out of digital text based platforms from the US is our language filtered and massacred through US context. It is very very bad in my opinion and incredibly lifeless and soulless.

It would be the same the other way around btw. Me writing a piece of text with significant Danish cultural context and humor, slang and references would be translated into total nonsense for an English speaker, I’m sure.

This meme was made by a “know it all”.

I dunno man. Depending on the age and person, it can be pretty difficult to get into how computers work. It really isn’t as much of a given as we think it is. I’m sure there are some older people who are just lazy, but I don’t think it is the case for everybody. Some older people don’t use computers unless they have to. They don’t spend time on them in their spare time to get more acquainted with how they work. For many it wasn’t a part of their lives for the first fifty years they spent on this planet. I’m in my mid 30s and I have areas of modern technology where I have just accepted that I can’t and won’t keep up because I simply don’t have the time, motivation or patience for it. I will learn if it is a necessity, but I also have limits to how many new things I can take in at this point while also having to earn money and pay my bills and maybe live a little on the side. So it is with that in mind that I think it is very much appropriate to cut many older people some slack and maybe have a little bit of empathy for where they are coming from.

Yeah. I think this is a pretty good point you are making there! Zoomers may not understand the tech language we grew up with, but in turn, we don’t understand the tech language they have grown up with either. It’s kinda like slang. It evolves over time and makes communication between generations awkward haha.

I think, for me, I feel uncomfortable relying so much on the tech doing a lot of the work for me. There is a loss of control in a sense even though it may make life more convenient in some areas (and not in others). It’s kinda like having to use a dishwasher for the first time and not really understanding how to operate it and then washing dishes by hand still, because that’s what you’re comfortable with.

Can’t blame a generation that wasn’t raised on computers as well as you can’t blame a generation that was raised by algothrims. I’m a millennial too, one of the older ones, and I have felt my tech literacy decay over the past ten years as the cancer that is silicon valley has spread and dominated the internet. It is to the point that I feel so trapped when I try to do anything online that becoming passive feels like the only choice if you play their game.

I have the benefit of remembering what the internet used to be like and what it still has the potential to be in the future, but the youths of today never experienced that. To them the internet is a feeding machine that encourages nay grooms them into becoming passive consumers. I can’t blame someone who literally never got the chance to learn because some tech bro scumbags in America decided that they should abuse their power to turn people into addicts.

This feels like the modern version of those people who gave out the numbers on their credit cards back in the 2000s and would freak out when their bank accounts got drained.