Google Translate

I recently received an email in French and needed to translate it. Went to Google, and typed in the word translate. The first result showed two boxes next to each other. The first box had a caption 'enter text' the second was 'English'. I pasted the text into the first box and it detected French and populated the second box with the English equivalent. The second also had a microphone icon. When I pressed it, a female voice correctly read aloud the English text. The amazing thing to me was that the translated text was so accurate. Not something we use everyday, but nice to know it is available when we need it.

English and the Internet

According to the translation firm Smartling, native English speakers only represented 3% of the total Internet population in 2011. Yet, 56% of online pages are English-only.

Many would not spend time on a Japanese website without understanding Japanese if Google Translate didn’t exist. Conversely, many would not spend time on an English website without an online translator.