Google Translates Into Revenues [Fool.com] March 29, 2007: "All of this should be music to Google investors' ears. Just imagine the possibilities as millions of citizens all across the globe stream onto the Internet and are no longer restricted to reading materials or accessing websites only in their native language. At a minimum, the service should lead to a sizeable increase in advertising revenue and that, in turn, should translate into higher revenues and profits for Google."
1954 all over again...
Thursday, March 29, 2007
Language Weaver Launches Consumer-Focused Subsidiary, Kontrib, First to Offer Multilingual Social Bookmarking Site
Language Weaver Launches Consumer-Focused Subsidiary, Kontrib, First to Offer Multilingual Social Bookmarking Site: "Kontrib uses Language Weaver’s automated language translation software, a proprietary software engine developed using statistical methodology, or mathematical probability algorithms, to automatically translate English, Spanish, French and Arabic-language news items and postings into any or all of these languages. If a user submits a story in English, Spanish, French or Arabic it is available in the other languages in a matter of minutes. "
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Google seeks world of instant translations - washingtonpost.com
Google seeks world of instant translations - washingtonpost.com: "Google chairman Eric Schmidt also sees broad political consequences of a world with easy translations.
'What happens when we have 100 languages in simultaneous translation? Google and other companies are working on statistical machine translation so that we can on demand translate everything all the time,' he told a conference earlier this year.
'Many, many societies have operated in language-defined communities where they really don't understand and are not particularly sympathetic to other peoples' views because of the barrier of language. We're about to have that breakthrough and it is a huge thing.'"
'What happens when we have 100 languages in simultaneous translation? Google and other companies are working on statistical machine translation so that we can on demand translate everything all the time,' he told a conference earlier this year.
'Many, many societies have operated in language-defined communities where they really don't understand and are not particularly sympathetic to other peoples' views because of the barrier of language. We're about to have that breakthrough and it is a huge thing.'"
Thursday, March 22, 2007
The Phoenix Online - Linguistics professor’s new book laments dying languages
The Phoenix Online - Linguistics professor’s new book laments dying languages: "K. David Harrison’s new book “When Languages Die: The Extinction of the World’s Languages and the Erosion of Human Knowledge” looks at what is lost from scientific, linguistic and humanistic vantage points when a language dies by examining field studies of endangered languages in Siberia, Mongolia, the Himalayas, North America and elsewhere."
Just finished reading this book. Very interesting, especially the discussion on calendars. It was a topic I hadn't read about in a long time...
Here is an interview to National Geographic.
Just finished reading this book. Very interesting, especially the discussion on calendars. It was a topic I hadn't read about in a long time...
Here is an interview to National Geographic.
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Powerset Welcomes Ronald Kaplan as Chief Technology and Science Officer @ SYS-CON Media
http://www.sys-con.com/read/348724.htm: Barney Pell, Founder and CEO of Powerset: "Ron's computational linguistic expertise is widely respected, and his decision to join our team gives us a clear competitive advantage over today's keyword-based search offerings. In addition, our ongoing exclusive right to the technology that Ron and his former team at PARC are developing comprises a core part of our aggressive business strategy."
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Saturday, February 10, 2007
Technology News: Portals & Search: PARC Licenses Search System, Aims to Upstage Google
Technology News: Portals & Search: PARC Licenses Search System, Aims to Upstage Google: "PARC's natural language technology -- which enables computers to understand plain-language expressions instead of having to work with keywords or preprogrammed commands -- is considered among the best in the world by search mavens.
The question remains, however, how well and how quickly that technology can be converted into a consumer-facing search engine.
Powerset said its cofounders -- Barney Pell, Steve Newcomb and Lorenzo Thione -- have been working with PARC since 2005 to explore and develop a market opportunity that could employ translating natural language in Internet search.
'Our collaboration with PARC results in remarkable new search capabilities that will turn the current statistical search model on its head,' said Pell.
As part of the deal, PARC researcher Ron Kaplan will join Powerset as chief technology officer. Pell called Kaplan 'an esteemed voice within the computational linguistics community.'
Though they did not release specific go-to-market plans, the two parties hinted the technology was close to ready.
'The time is right to tell the world about the game-changing technology we've created,' Kaplan said."
The question remains, however, how well and how quickly that technology can be converted into a consumer-facing search engine.
Powerset said its cofounders -- Barney Pell, Steve Newcomb and Lorenzo Thione -- have been working with PARC since 2005 to explore and develop a market opportunity that could employ translating natural language in Internet search.
'Our collaboration with PARC results in remarkable new search capabilities that will turn the current statistical search model on its head,' said Pell.
As part of the deal, PARC researcher Ron Kaplan will join Powerset as chief technology officer. Pell called Kaplan 'an esteemed voice within the computational linguistics community.'
Though they did not release specific go-to-market plans, the two parties hinted the technology was close to ready.
'The time is right to tell the world about the game-changing technology we've created,' Kaplan said."