Microsoft have recently announced a real-time translation feature, for subscribers of their Office 365 package, which will offer live subtitle translations and captions for PowerPoint presentations.
While subtitles and captions aren’t necessarily new to PowerPoint, these advances do mean that millions more subscribers will be able to access the new translation features. Originally debuted in 2017 as an add-in, it will be rolled out to subscribers, as standard, from the end of this month (January 2019).
The new feature offers the following highlights:
• 12 spoken languages can be translated into more than 60 target languages as subtitles, or captions, in real time
• Context clues are interpreted by PowerPoint to give more accuracy when dealing with names and terms
• Subtitles and captions can be positioned by users and altered depending upon preferences
There are however, some questions regarding the accuracy of the feature which Microsoft suggest will depend upon audio quality, accents, and acoustics.
Real-time translations, available as either live subtitles, or spoken, are not new – many of the large tech giants such as, Facebook, Amazon and Apple offer translation features or Apps, but often the accuracy of AI translation and interpretation can be lacking. Google have recently unveiled a captioning feature for their presentation App, Slides, while their smartphone, the Google Pixel 3, offers instant translation with their Pixel buds.
Microsoft’s latest addition to its translation features for PowerPoint are likely to be a massive help to multilingual teams, firms that exploring new foreign markets, and hard of hearing employees.
The pilot scheme, for the automatic translation subtitle feature, was trialled by the National Institute for the Deaf with Microsoft working in partnership with the Rochester Institute of Technology. According to Microsoft approximately 90% of the accessibility team at Microsoft have a disability.
However, in the UK, the employment rate for those with hearing loss is only 65%, compared to 79% of people with no long-term health issue or disability.
While 65% of deaf people have stated that developments in technology have made it easier to be deaf in the workplace, only 13% believe there is enough support available to help deaf people to look for work.
AI language technology has become increasingly beneficial for those with hearing impairments, which allows for greater integration in the workplace and Microsoft’s latest translation features for PowerPoint should offer further help.
There have been over 30 accessibility features added by Microsoft over the last few years, including the launch of a $25million five year program to fund further development of AI tools to support people with disabilities.
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