Re: [vmeet] [Mentoring-coordinators] Remote Attendance: Simultaneous Translation Software

[John C Klensin <[e-mail]>]

--On Saturday, April 09, 2016 19:20 +0000
[e-mail] wrote:

> 
> I was thinking simultaneous interpretation as in ICANN
> meetings.  Although, translation of meeting materials is
> certainly a great first step.   Of course, people need to get
> their foils into the WG chair more than 3 days in advance.
> 
> What I have seen (please let me know your experience), is that
> people can read a different language better than they can
> understand spoken speech.  In particular when people speak
> quickly and / or have accents particular to their region of
> the world.   Of course, this will be a problem for the
> software also.  But some software can be trained to the
> speaker.

Nalini,

Let me try to understand the requirements you have just
suggested:

(1) People have to get their foils in more than 3 days in
advance.  That is a requirement in many WGs (but not the
plenaries) today, but it is often ignored.   In addition,...

(2) People who want their actual remarks available in
machine-readable form and/or translation have to have those
materials available in written form several days in advance.  In
addition, they need to align their presentations very closely to
what they have submitted, rather than adapting them to, e.g.,
other discussions within the WG.  I think that is undesirable in
and of itself as well and encouraging people to read their
talks, which is almost inevitably boring and tedious.

(3) In addition, people who want those actual remarks, including
remarks that they might make from floor microphones (and
remembering that IETF WG sessions are supposed to be about
discussions, not just presentations), will have to spend the
time to train the speech-to-text systems to their voices before
the IETF meeting starts.  I've learned to allow between one and
two FTE days for such training, but even a few hours would be a
fairly big deal when multiplied by everyone who might speak up
during a meeting.

I don't think that is plausible.  YMMD.

    john