Universal Translator soon available

Universal Translators are common in science fiction. Star Trek has the universal translator. The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy has the paradoxical Babel Fish. In Farscape, John Chrichton is implanted with translator microbes. In The Last Starfighter, Alex Rogan is given a chip that was attached to the collar of his shirt. And the companions of Doctor Who have an instant translation service by a telepathic field generated by the TARDIS.


Thanks to Google, universal translation will become available on Earth soon. Google's prototype language translator, Conversation Mode, uses Android phones to record spoken words and then play them back in a different language.

Conversation Mode combines the technology of Google Voice and Google Translate (which only works for text) to translate over fifty languages via a speech interface on a smartphone. Read more here: Google Waves Goodbye to Language Barriers : Discovery News

The video shows a demonstration of Conversation mode.