Because almost all freelance translators are dependent on agencies as sources of work, the destruction of freelance translating careers by AI is not a prediction, because it has already happened, but there are two misguided groups of people who delude or consciously pretend that things are going to be fine: Adaptists and adoptists. There is also a third group, which I want to call schadenfreude-seeking aspirationals, but I will deal with that delusion in another post.
The people promoting “adapting” to AI often don’t say what adapting might actually be. It is clear, however, that most of these people are just sugar-coating or mischaracterizing extremely low-paid AI post-editing, which is not only insultingly low-paid work, but also mind-numbing, and it is a dead-end task that won’t lead to translation work from any kind of client.
And then we’ve got the “adoptists,” who promote the use of AI by freelancers to do translations. If that helps you, fine, but do these people actually think that any but a tiny portion of freelancers will be able to acquire clients for their AI translation services, when the only clients they have been historically able to acquire are agencies that have essentially stopped ordering translation from humans? To think adopting under those conditions is either fully delusional or totally uniformed by the numerous obstacles that only a tiny number of freelancers can overcome.
Many translator don’t even have a grasp of what those obstacles are, having lived and worked for years locked on tier two of the translation business without any hope of reaching tier one or knowing how to get there. Some believe the self-proclaimed coaches who tell them they need to engage in “personal branding.” Well, perhaps, but from what I have seen, these coaches leave the difficult parts behind the smoke and mirrors. Bacj ub 2019, before many people, including me, even thought the end would arrive so soon, I discussed some survival solutions in my presentation at IJET-30 in Cairns. Even more needs to be said and can be said now, but few want to listen, and the advice is not usable by most freelancers, who are sadly locked on tier two, which these days is not populated by many freelancers who actually get to earn from translating.
It must be depressing to many freelancers to contemplate their demise, and also further depressing to contemplate the reasons, which underscore the futility for most of even trying to survive by translating.
For me personally, it is sad to watch many highly capable freelancers denying and deluding to avoid facing those depressing realities.
