Dvorak: I'm Sick of Waiting for a Decent Machine Translation!

If computers can play a credible world-class game of chess, why can't they translate complex sentences written in the world's major languages, John Dvorak kvetches in PC Magazine.

Dvorak ran a chunk of text from a French newspaper through various machine translation systems. The translations are quite hilarious, and quite useless.

Vous avez essayé d'obtenir une bourse d'étude mais celle-ci, fonction des revenus de vos parents, vous a été refusée. Vous trouvez le cas injuste? Comment cela risque-t-il d'influer sur votre scolarité? Partagez votre expérience sur ce blog en utilisant le lien "Commentaire" ci-dessous..com

A reasonable translation is as follows:

You tried to obtain a scholarship, but it was refused because of your parents' income. Did you think this was unfair? Tell us how you think it would affect your schooling and tell us your experiences by adding a comment to the blog. Click on the comment button below.

Freetranslation.com:

You tried to obtain a study stock market but this one, function of the income of your parents, you was refused. You find the unfair case? How that does it risk influencing on your schooling? Divide your experience on this blog while using the link "Commentary" here-under. com

Grade: F. Just horrible—and wrong!

08-Oct-2006 By BL Ochman