Anodyne presentations to freelance translators framed as discussion of whether to “embrace or reject AI” completely miss or actively look away from the fundamental problem presented by AI to freelancers.
Agency clients of freelancers are quickly moving away from using professionals to do translations, and most freelancers are not equipped to find and acquire clients who will not use AI themselves.
Some freelancers are being told that adopting or “adapting to” AI themselves is the answer. It is not. Some translators inexplicably think that forming a company is the answer. It is not. But mostly, freelancers are subjected to diversionary and not very actionable presentations and comments by both colleagues and translation organizations.
Some freelancers living in their source-language country are not able to interface successfully with clients in their source language. Some of them abhor the idea of selling from the get go, and many of them are members of the large majority of translators who have been “groomed to meet their end” by becoming accustomed to and totally reliant on being able to work at a distance from clients, without even going outside of their homes or meeting people.
For the few freelance translators who will survive, in order even to buy some time before the end arrives, the discussion needs to focus not on the merits of AI, but on how to acquire clients not using—and not willing to use—AI. That means selling.
Selling involves doing much more than most freelancers want to think about, and the sad, career-ending reality is that most freelance translators are not nearly equipped to do much more than sit in front of their computers. That’s not going to work for the vast majority of translators, for whom the end is on the visible horizon.