cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/70666762
The AI program, called NiCE and made by an Israeli-American company with the same name, promises employers it will create “a more agile, efficient, and human workforce.” For many of the workers themselves, however, the experience has been negative. “NiCE is supposed to optimize the perfect workload,” said Karolina Yermak, a Russian interpreter at LanguageLine. “But you get the workload of two instead of one, without enough time to even take a sip of water between calls.”
Interpreters are often listed among the workers at the highest risk of replacement by AI. But interviews with a half dozen LanguageLine employees reveal a different phenomenon: AI is not so much eliminating as eroding the quality of their work. In a recent survey of 161 workers conducted by the Communication Workers of America, who are seeking to unionize the interpreters, a majority of LanguageLine workers reported high levels of burnout, insufficient time between calls and frequent back and neck pain.
3 Comments
k0e3@lemmy.ca · 9 pts · 5d
As a freelance interpreter, I've been getting less inquiries about less serious work, but with my experience, I still get plenty of high-paying, high-stakes jobs. It must be a hellscape for anyone trying to get entry-level jobs though...
supersquirrel@lemmy.ca · 5 pts · 5d
I just find it so existentially suffocating that people have become convinced by AI and Silicon Valley type thinking that translation of language is a broadly "solvable" thing, it seems the idea that translation of human language is endlessly peculiar has been lost in the broader social consciousness and I am shellshocked in a way.
A society that sees translation of human language only as a difficult algorithm to be solved and not an art itself... or rather the true form of art described in a practical framing is surely one terminally seduced with totalitarian ways of seeing the world.
pilferjinx@piefed.social · 3 pts · 5d
I do love some star-trek universal translation though. Maybe a Babel Fish for funsies.