Speak Your Mind in Any Language with Skype Translator

The driving force behind innovation in technology is the need to make things simpler. Whether it’s instant messaging, that has made communication between two people in different parts of the world easy and instantaneous, or it’s e-commerce which has revolutionized the way people shop by making it possible for everybody to get anything they want from the comfort of their home – technology is determined to simplify, to remove complexity, to integrate, to include and to ensure that the largest possible number of people can reap the benefits of innovation.

In a similar vein, Microsoft has introduced a new and exciting feature to Skype – Skype Translator – which opens the door for real time, multilingual speech recognition and translation, aimed at facilitating conversations among people without a common language, thus simplifying and enriching global human communication. With Skype Translator, Microsoft intends to break down language barriers and allow people from different backgrounds, different countries and different cultures to work towards common goals and objectives.

How does Skype Translator work?

Skype translator is the culmination of a lot of different technologies being put together effectively. Essentially, all the technology that the Translator uses has existed for some time now, but it is only now that it has been integrated into a form that can be put to use in order to bring people who speak different languages closer.

Skype Translator works in four steps – the first being speech recognition. After a sentence is spoken, a deep neural network analyzes the speech and transforms it into text, following which the second step – that of speech correction – is implemented so as to get rid of stutters and repetitions that might have crept into the sentence, after which the text is ready for translation. The third step is the crucial translation itself, and like speech recognition and correction, the technology has existed for quite some time. Skype uses Microsoft Translator to get the sentence translated, after which the final step – that of text to speech conversion – is fairly straightforward. The process is repeated again when the person at the other end replies, and so on.

The real breakthrough with Skype Translator is not the technology in itself, but the way it is integrated to provide a seamless, real time experience that provides accurate translations in just a second. In addition, Skype Translator relies on machine learning, which means that it gets smarter as people use it more and more, thereby enhancing the user experience as time goes by.

How can you start using Skype Translator?

Unfortunately, Skype Translator is currently only able to perform speech translation between English and Spanish, but automatic text translation is available for 40 different languages. In order to avail the Skype Translator service, you need to using Skype on Windows 8.1 on your desktop or device and also you must register here in order to get your invite. After that you just install the Translator Client and find somebody who speaks Spanish to check it out!

Below is a video preview released by Skype showcasing the features and utilization of Skype Translator in an adorably charming way. Enjoy!