From everything I can see of posts and comments from translators on LinkedIn and elsewhere, I fully expect that great numbers freelance translators and their organizations will continue to deny, delude, and divert attention away from the impending demise of freelance translating as a realistic career.
I fully understand the pain involved in contemplating the end, but the end is here already. To deny it is simply delusional.
Almost all freelance translators are stuck in this position because they are unable to acquire translation-consuming clients. Most are stuck working for agencies that simply act as brokers for their services.
Translators who think they will attract or somehow acquire direct clients to replace agencies should go out and try it. It will become apparent to almost all translators that direct clients are out of their reach.
And the agencies freelancers have relied on are not going to come back. The belief that they’ll come back is a delusion. The agency translation work model has all but ended.
Only a very small number of freelancers will survive, because very few freelancers are capable of acquiring direct clients (later adopters of AI), which at this point, other than getting in-house work at a non-translation entity, is one of the few paths for survival, at least for a while, doing language-related work.
And translators need to stop telling themselves and others that post-editing AI output is the new task for translators and that it is translation. Post-editing is not translation, and it does not offer earning potential at anywhere near a level that would make it a realistic career, the mind-numbing work of that deadend activity aside.
People need to get real, set the pain aside, and think about what to do next.
