The ultimate test of machine translation is in the translation. Can someone who can’t read the source language understand enough of the text to take an appropriate action? We’re not talking the BLEU test here or a NIST MT evaluation — just a simple test case with everyday language.

October has been a busy month for the machine translation crowd. Google dropped SYSTRAN in favor of its own statistical MT technology, Language Weaver expanded its European presence, and PROMT saw its online MT usage on the upswing. Sooner or later, whether you like/want/know it or not, MT will touch everyone.