New Facebook translation connect makes some skeptical

Want to read your friend’s wall posts on Facebook in French? You now can at the click of a button. The popular social networking Web site now offers a new multilingual feature called Translations for Facebook Connect.

Translations for Facebook Connect, created Sept. 24, allows Web site designers to implant a Facebook login box on their Web site. By logging into their account, users can translate any Web site into another language using the Facebook service.
Central Michigan University foreign language students are willing to try the new feature and see how it can be helpful.

“I usually don’t use online translators because of all the mistakes, but I feel like this is more reliable because you are getting help from real people,” said Ashley Moore, Shelby Township sophomore and SPN 202: Intermediate Spanish II student.

Users can then post their results onto their walls so their friends can vote on which translation is the most accurate. The idea is to avoid all the mistakes that other translation Web sites often have.

Ishpeming freshman and FRN 101: Elementary French I student Mollie Anderson believes Translations for Facebook Connect can be helpful, especially if she had a lot of friends who spoke French on Facebook. Although optimistic, she has some doubts about the idea. “Honestly, I think it might be viewed as a joke,” Anderson said.

Used for teaching?
CMU foreign language professors have mixed emotions about the new feature.
“It could help to spread understanding and knowledge, but I’m very skeptical about it being used as a language tool for learning,” said assistant professor of foreign languages Amy Ransom, who teaches French. “I also have academic honesty concerns if it were used for help with an assignment for a class.”
Spanish instructor Cindy Espinosa said, “Single-word translations are reliable from a dictionary or Web site but, when it comes to stringing the words together, it gets very complicated,” Espinosa said. “That’s where people can really help.”


By Theresa Clift Source: http://www.cm-life.com/2009/10/07/new-facebook-translation-connect-makes-some-skeptical/

New Facebook translation connect makes some skeptical

Want to read your friend’s wall posts on Facebook in French? You now can at the click of a button. The popular social networking Web site now offers a new multilingual feature called Translations for Facebook Connect.

Translations for Facebook Connect, created Sept. 24, allows Web site designers to implant a Facebook login box on their Web site. By logging into their account, users can translate any Web site into another language using the Facebook service.
Central Michigan University foreign language students are willing to try the new feature and see how it can be helpful.

“I usually don’t use online translators because of all the mistakes, but I feel like this is more reliable because you are getting help from real people,” said Ashley Moore, Shelby Township sophomore and SPN 202: Intermediate Spanish II student.

Users can then post their results onto their walls so their friends can vote on which translation is the most accurate. The idea is to avoid all the mistakes that other translation Web sites often have.

Ishpeming freshman and FRN 101: Elementary French I student Mollie Anderson believes Translations for Facebook Connect can be helpful, especially if she had a lot of friends who spoke French on Facebook. Although optimistic, she has some doubts about the idea. “Honestly, I think it might be viewed as a joke,” Anderson said.

Used for teaching?
CMU foreign language professors have mixed emotions about the new feature.
“It could help to spread understanding and knowledge, but I’m very skeptical about it being used as a language tool for learning,” said assistant professor of foreign languages Amy Ransom, who teaches French. “I also have academic honesty concerns if it were used for help with an assignment for a class.”
Spanish instructor Cindy Espinosa said, “Single-word translations are reliable from a dictionary or Web site but, when it comes to stringing the words together, it gets very complicated,” Espinosa said. “That’s where people can really help.”


By Theresa Clift
Source: http://www.cm-life.com/2009/10/07/new-facebook-translation-connect-makes-some-skeptical/

Bankrupt Medicare to be Burdened With $Billions More for Translation Costs

Source: http://news.prnewswire.com/DisplayReleaseContent.aspx?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/08-18-2009/0005079432&EDATE=

ARLINGTON, Va., Aug. 18

"Proposed health care reform legislation now under consideration in Congress will add billions of dollars of un-reimbursed cost to the Medicare program to provide free interpreters for non-English speaking patients," says K.C. McAlpin, executive director of ProEnglish, a national organization that advocates for making English the official language of government in the United States.
The "America's Affordable Health Choices Act," H.R. 3200, Section 1221 (b) says Medicare health care providers that fail to "substantially provide language services to limited English proficient beneficiaries" face severe fines and penalties.
"In light of the fact that the Medicare program already faces $38 trillion in unfunded liabilities according to the most recent trustees' report, and is predicted to be bankrupt in a few years, adding an entitlement to free translation services is unbelievably irresponsible," McAlpin charges.
"It is bad public policy because it removes more incentives for immigrants to learn English and become self-sufficient - something that is not only in the immigrants' interest but our nation as a whole," he adds.
"It should not be overlooked that by requiring providers to provide interpreters, H.R. 3200 transfers liability for injuries or deaths due to translation errors from the patient to the medical provider, which will only add to the skyrocketing cost of provider insurance coverage. That simply makes no sense," McAlpin concludes.