To translate is to leave something, almost everything, out. Translation is a conscious process where the elements that are put aside are as important as those that we choose to keep. AI, thus, cannot translate because it is incapable of understanding the act of leaving behind.

See also: AI to write and summarise novels and make films. Robots to walk your dog, play with your kids, nurse your parents. We're taking away the things that make you human, imagination, joy, and connection, so you can GET BACK TO WORK. It's never a robot to cook dinner while I read a book, is it?

"The UK creative industries — which contributed £125 billion to the economy in 2024 and supported 2.4 million jobs — are being destroyed by an AI sector that, whatever its long-term potential, contributed just £11 billion in the same year and supported only 85,000 jobs." archive.is/hvRv2

But it’s being used for so many crappy and evil things I am honestly against even using it for things it would be ostensibly useful for.

Pleased to announce I've been hired to do the marketing for this campaign

A big yes to the offering of live audio description for today’s FA Cup match between Arsenal and Aston Vill. Such a big step in the right direction for accessibility of the women’s game 🙌

I realise I'm just a freak, but living in a multicultural city is the best thing of all time, it's just the best possible human experience and i can not understand why anyone on earth would be like "weve got to destroy this"

Directly responsible for the demise of dozens of companies and recording studios which had made London the go-to place in Europe for dubbing and voiceovers. Great.

Finally reading this great essay on what translators do and what language is! This part in particular hit home for me.

We translate books because reading, writing, creating, sharing with others, bridging cultures and communicating are human activities that give us a reason to live. Take the human element out, and what even is the point? Why do it if humans are not enjoying the process or the product?

Yeah, accessibility is low hanging fruit for AI, because no one really wants to pay for it. The attitude is “we HAVE to do it, but we don’t have to do it WELL”. 😏

By which I mean AI essays are just you capering in your jesters' bells for the emperor. Instead you should be getting smashed & setting off tens of thousands of pounds worth of fireworks all at once in an empty building. Light up the skyline. Cause mayhem.

Every facet of generative AI has made my professional life worse, without question, but THIS specific aspect has been driving me NUTS. Clients, who have made me toil for weeks over indescribably small details, are now approving & producing in-house commercial artwork that looks like a fever dream.

“AI is clearly sticking around so you have to get used to it” wrong. I don’t have to get used to shit. I am a practiced hater and I can keep this going for decades if I am required to

Also include audio description in this. I queued up The Man Who Invented Christmas last year, interested to hear how they approached the AD, and while the description writing was fine, the voice was AI and felt spooky. That's taking a job from a voice actor and insulting the blind audience.

"The idea of deporting people with settled status is disgusting, and anyone proposing it should be immediately drummed out of polite society. Breaking promises made in good faith to our friends and neighbours is racist, extremist and immoral." I'm basically shouting at the sky here, but still.

“Let’s call it for what it is: bullshit. The truth is, politicians have talked about little else but immigration for decades and in the most dehumanising ways. Polanski added: “Stop the boats’ is all we hear. Well, today I'm saying ‘stop the bullshit’.” www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home...

Times births column today

now ive been in the workforce for a while, so I'm not surprised that some of you might not be aware of this "hack": when your boss says, hey, are you easily replaceable by a computer, you say no. you don't say yes. that is what we call "a whoopsie"

ah! maybe that is a big part of it. writing is a technology we invented to store something we evolved to create: spoken language. obvious LLM writing *has no speaker*. 'steady progress, gentle pacing' are words without a speaker. they are just words in themselves.

Something with Roman numerals? All I've got is Charlus I.

Youtubes Auto dubbing is surely one of the worst features anywhere ever.

1. quick deepl/human comparison for you. This is from my current project on state sexual violence against Greenlandic women, which is obviously pretty sensitive stuff.

I wish surveys would stop asking me if I'd recommend something to a friend. I never recommend anything to friends so I always tick no. If you want to know if I like the product just ask me if I like the product.

So, we’re raising a glass to the Lionesses, ITV and Guinness, Channel 4 and inclusion. Goal-den. 5/5

@nathanaclark.bsky.social @windycoys.bsky.social I'm sure you've seen / heard Takai saying his name at the beginning of the medical day vid. IMO the key thing with GB > JP and back is keep in mind that vowels are just gaps between consonants. The rhythm is very quick and staccato...

This reminds me that my favourite Inspirals song is the one with Mark E Smith.

I wrote a piece about my time at UK Games Expo this year, tiny languages, and being autistic. I hope it conveys what I wanted it to. It's called CAT, PLANT, MONSTER: www.timclarepoet.co.uk/uk-games-exp...

🤖💀

This article does a great job of showing how inferior machine translation is and the sheer drudgery and frustration of being expected to post-edit rather than just allowing human translators to do their thing from the start, since like all creative work, people are so much better at it than AI.

Last night I attended the #OneVoiceAwards2025 honoured to have been shortlisted for 3 awards. Well, I won the #OVA25 award: ‘Best TV / Web Commercial (male)’ for the Poppy Appeal Campaign. Thanks to my awesome agents @damngoodvoices.bsky.social and to Leagas Delaney and The Royal British Legion.

You’ll never catch me supporting AI anything. I’m an audio description writer worried about losing my work to this absolute crap.

Why wouldn't you want a person to earn a living, being paid modestly for providing a service which is enjoyable for them to do, and enjoyable for an audience to listen to? Why would you decide it's better to reduce the amount of human pleasure and satisfaction involved in the process?

I'm tired of translation colleagues (who are often in the older generation) saying "AI won't take your job, it's not good enough to replace us"--BUT THAT DOESN'T MATTER. It doesn't matter that gen AI is terrible at translation, that it constantly makes mistakes, managers are gonna push it anyway.

In past times, not crediting your translators was a power move to attract more clients, because if a game had good loc reviews and the only name displayed was your agency, that would mean more potential games. Nowadays, it is also a tool to silence us and replace us with machine translation.

Translators have been the canaries in the AI coalmine for a couple of years now and we are already losing work to these systems. Having existing work used to train them without permission or compensation just adds insult to injury.

New #axschat Video: The Father-Son Journey Through Accessibility & Acting. The BBC iPlayer was launched in 2007 with screen reader accessibility, closed captions, & audio description. 20 years later, Zak appears on the very platform his father Gareth helped make accessible vimeo.com/1070490497?s...

AUDIO DESCRIPTION is entertaining, funny, and wholly unique. This is the short story artform at its best. READ the full #moviesky #unstoppableshort #filmreview @ Joe's and check out AUDIO DESCRIPTION @ #Slamdance readatjoes.org/2025/02/28/a...

Fancied seeing A Real Pain. Thanks, tech bros.

"Imagine a world in which an A.I. can analyze your reading patterns and alert you that you’re about to buy a book where there’s only a 10 percent chance you’ll get past Page 6..." Fuck off. That's not empowerment, that's outsourcing your soul. That's outsouling. www.nytimes.com/2025/01/25/o...

@illdave.bsky.social I wasn't sure where that photo was taken, so I asked Google and by extension Quora. Oof.

Shouldn’t have read that article about Labour’s AI plans for the UK because now I’ve woken myself up with anger

Just made an extremely lame Jamuary joke, then clicked on the tag and discovered that of course it is a thing, but with jamming as in Marley rather than jam as in doughnuts. This is why I will always be a lurker, never a poster.

Go on any jobs site and look at writing jobs, they are all the same thing: "turn AI slop into useful stuff". It is taking more human effort to turn this garbage into useful work than it would be just to have a person do it in the first place.

UK Folks. If you're concerned about the catastrophic impact of generative AI on the creative industries & the theft of artists/writers creations, then you REALLY NEED to complete the below online consultation form. This is your chance to say 'fuck off, this is not okay' www.gov.uk/government/c...

It must be hard for voiceover artists who have a naturally Matt Berry tone to their voice if everyone thinks you’re trying to do the Matt Berry voice.

Michael Kiwanuka's new album is a perfect soundtrack to worrying about Ange Postecoglou.

Life is a Library' Short blog about the loss of our beloved daughter, Maddy on the wonderful @youthlibraries website: shorturl.at/5A5mE

I have a big article out today about being diagnosed as autistic while I was writing my latest book, & how tabletop games help me navigate the world as an autistic person. I hope it's interesting to some people. www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...

Well I guess it's time to finally christen this new account