Translating content in the web has become a major issue. Most people have found it hard to translate the content in the web. This has hindered people from understanding the content. “Luis Von Ahn a Carnegie Mellon professor” developed the “reCAPTCHA and ESP game” to help in translation. The professor has helped use crowd sourcing to help overcome the problem of translation of web content. Crowd sourcing refers to the process of outsourcing activities that have been performed by employees, contractor and other people using open call (Howe, 2008).
Crowd sourcing was first employed by Jeff Howe. The concept of crowd sourcing is an open call to any person in the society. Crowd sourcing helps bring together people who have the right expertise to solve complex issues and those who are able to bring new ideas. For instance, the public can be invited to develop a new technology. The community can also help analyze huge amounts of data. The professor has developed a new project known as Duolingo for the last one and half years. The professor argues that learning new languages will help translate the web content as the new languages will act as a translator. The professor is planning to launch a private beta version to demonstrate how the languages act as translators (Discover, 2011).
The professor argues that getting good translation online is hard. Most researchers argue that there is need for human beings to help in the translation of the content. Professor Von Ahn is planning to make an effective and free web translation to help overcome the issue (Howe, 2008). The main aim of the project is to transform language translation into something that all people support. This will ensure people having no enough education are able to understand the content. It will also help people who do not have bilinguals. Bilinguals refer to the ability to use two languages.
The person using the languages should have equal fluency. Most people are not able to use two languages and this makes it hard for them to comprehend the content. Thus, there is need to develop software to help translate the content. There are more than 1 million people who are learning foreing languages. For example, most people have been learning French and Spanish. The professor claims that the Duolingo site will be 100% free from language learning. In this case, the users will not be required to learn a new language and then apply it. Instead, they will learn the language by translating the web. That is through action (Discover, 2011).
The professor and other researchers have been testing the site to determine if it is effective. The site has proved effective as it has helped teach users foreign languages well. In addition, the site has proved effective as it has given accurate translations like the trsnlations provided by professional language translators. Crowd sourcing has been applied in various areas to overcome problems that cannot be resolved using machine learning. For instance, it has been used in “Google image labeler”. In conclusion, the project is good as it will ensure different people in the world are able to access the internet (Discover, 2011).
Reference
Discover.(2011). Crowd sourcing. Using language students to translate the internet. Retrieved from http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2011/04/13/crowd-sourcing-using-language-students-to-translate-the-internet/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+80beats+%2880beats%29on 19/04/2011
Howe,J.(2008).Crowdsourcing.Why the power of the crowd is driving the future of business. Crown Business
