I set out to make this look terrible, an over-exaggeration of bad AI art and awkward sentences, but, whew, this is too bad.
I’m a solid English speaker. In 2nd grade, I learned “Pig Latin” and became weirdly fluent in it. I struggled more with Spanish, because, for some reason, Americans start learning a second language about seven years too late. With great effort, I had a decent enough conversational level when I was using it more for school and work. I’ve always wished there was a better way to talk to everyone. The Babel Fish from Hitchhiker’s Guide, the automatic translation provided by the TARDIS, the translation implants in Cyberpunk. I love the idea of being able to just understand and speak all languages, exactly as they’re intended to be heard and spoken.
AI seems to be a good tool for this problem. AI can gleam some intent out of spoken word, and, while it’s not contextual, it can at least provide rapid translations. Combine it with headphones like AirPods Pro for live translation or, better yet, combine it with AR glasses and for real-time subtitles. These can help you learn a language for yourself, hearing and understanding at the same time.
When learning a language, people are the only source you should turn to. People have culture, idioms, historical and current context, even their own style. In just a sentence or two, I’ve been able to identify an author without ever having read the book it was quoted from. That’s why AI should only ever be used for quick translations, not teaching a language.
Duolingo thinks otherwise. They’ve laid off a significant portion of their translation staff, replaced with AI. Some humans will remain on the job, but their role will largely be correction and editing, not creating the actual phrases. Something will be lost in translation, but with no natural speakers to learn from, how would you ever know?
Jobs Lost to AI
Duolingo doesn’t say how many people they’ve laid off, or how many came from which departments, only that it was only 10% of their contractors. While Duolingo has over 600 employees, almost half of them engineers, the work on creating language content is done by contractors. They create the sentences and phrases used in lessons. According to a Reddit user, who seemed to break the news of layoffs prior to the official announcement, the layoffs were sizable. User “No_Comb_4582” claimed that half of their team was laid off, and they worked on “one of the top three languages on Duolingo.” They specifically said that Duolingo told them that AI could “come up with content and translations” and “pretty much anything else translators did.” The remaining team members are, according to this user, largely “content curators.” They state the remaining team members “simply check the AI crap that gets produced and then push it through.”
In much nicer language, a representative from Duolingo confirmed this role, stating, “human experts validate that the output quality is high enough for teaching and is in accordance with CEFR standards for what learners should be able to do at each CEFR level.” CERF is the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CERF), used to measure language proficiency.
No_Comb_4582 pointed out that this means content will be the same across languages, with AI providing translations of the same content to all users. Obviously languages evolve with their cultures. Everywhere has different sayings, different gestures. Every region has their own middle finger, their own secretly dirty phrases, their own slang, their own ways of saying “I love you.” All of that could be lost to AI translations that don’t take in context, and simply create the same auto-generated phrases for every language. While AI has always been soulless, this feels like a particularly harmful example of removing the soul from something where a soul is most vital: communication and connection.
In an entirely predictable situation, the AI used, from OpenAI’s ChatGPT-4, has been trained on content taken from across the web, often without permission. The translations these employees provided, the fluent speakers they helped make, may have contributed to the very tools that made them obsolete. Jobless at the hands of the AI, potentially trained without their permission, on their work, their conversations, their lives.
Understanding Lost to AI
AI proponents, who are usually CEOs of companies selling AI, say that more jobs will be created by AI than taken by the technology. They’re usually less clear about what those jobs could be. Certainly they don’t imagine AI replacing their job as CEO, after all, how could an AI just do whatever their board tells it to do, following the same patterns of every other company doing the same thing?
We may lose context and understanding between people through different languages, but perhaps it is something we can gloss over? Humans are great at learning and adapting. Someone could use their knowledge, the confidence they get from their AI-lead language lessons, and decide to travel. Maybe they’ll be lucky enough to live in a country that gives them more than five days off a year and they can spend a week or two in a different country, filling in the blanks in their language learning with local customs and idioms. They could learn the little subtitles in the language from real speakers. Perhaps they wouldn’t have the confidence to even do that without AI-taught language learning? Maybe they wouldn’t have taken that chance?
It’s hard to see how people losing their jobs to machines trained on other people’s work is a good thing, but I do like the idea of people being more willing to learn from each other. Still, it’s hard to believe that more unemployed people who struggle to find new jobs will be a good thing. Traveling, after all, is expensive.
Language proficiency, understanding other people, is important. However, language has always been more than the words. It’s sharing a culture and ideas. It’s empathy for people you couldn’t even understand prior to the lessons. Helping people communicate could only help unite us better. The question is, would AI-driven lessons really help us come together, or will it skimp on the most important lessons we learn from each other when we share our languages?
Human Obsolescence
“Duolingo laid off a huge percentage of their contract translators, and the remaining ones are simply reviewing AI translations to make sure they’re ‘acceptable’. This is the world we’re creating. Removing the humanity from how we learn to connect with humanity.”
– Reid Southen, via Twitter
According to Resume Builder, 37% of the companies they surveyed used AI to replace workers. 44% agree it will lead to layoffs in the future. IBM claims they’ve stopped hiring for roles they believe AI will soon replace. What jobs are created by software that is being used to eliminate all jobs? Who’s left to make money when the only people profiting from AI are those who “own” it, built on the work of those who find themselves without jobs or income?
i was a duolingo contractor for 2 years and it was always clear to me that they love AI and that they take advantage of the fact that a majority of their workforce are contractors (ie no benefits or job security) :/
– jade, via Twitter
Those with plenty of money and power aren’t worried about AI. It won’t take their money away. They don’t work for their money, it works for them. Having money is their only job. But for those who have to work for their money, their anxieties couldn’t be more valid. We’re already seeing jobs disappear, likely forever, while AI companies profit from data they took from places unknown, maybe from the very workers they’re not replacing. Will your job be next?
Sources:
- Lauren Forristal, TechCrunch
- Jennifer Korn, CNN
- Mariella Moon, Engadget
- Resume Builder