Luke Spear

Pieter Francberg here, author of future international bestsellers “Freedom isn’t free” and “Once for my baby”, published in any language you like.

I’m actually just writing from your future, I’ve chosen this guy’s webpage to post to as he seems like he wouldn’t start running around claiming to be a “messiah” like that other guy did when I accidentally dialled in the wrong date. Seems to have caused a little confusion for you back there, but it’ll soon work out.

This all might seem a little unusual for you, dear reader, but it’s quite simple from here. I just fire up my retinal display, open a post page and start thinking out my message. Once done, I select the language I want - in this case English, British standard 2008 version - and the date I’d like to post to. See, science has recently discovered how to travel through time but only for sub-atomic and quantum sized particles. That led to some pretty interesting developments, this transtime mail for one, but I digress.

What I wanted to tell you about, not as a bleak apocalyptic message of destruction but as a gentle warning to human translators, was that things are going to change quite soon and you may suddenly find a lot less work being sent your way, for translation, at least. Computing and technology are gradually changing your lifestyle in imperceptible stages at the moment, (your moment, that is) so small that the change is almost undetectable. But due to the lowering cost of computer components there will soon be a surge in people connected and trading globally. A critical mass of people requiring just-enough-to-understand translations will be reached in a short time and machine translation will be in vogue.

Human translators will gradually be replaced by proof-readers who check machine text as it comes onscreen. They are paid by the hour at a minimum wage. The job will require editing a stream of text as it is piped onscreen as fast as the proof-reader can go, the slowest readers being replaced daily in the online network of millions. But what about the people who need legal contracts or mission critical texts translating? How can they trust a machine? I hear you cry. Well, AI improvements and processing power have come a long way in a short time and you wouldn’t believe what wonders await you. There’ll be plenty of opportunities for you to retrain, but it may be better to start thinking about your future now. Concentrate on your writing skills because your potential market is about to grow like you wouldn’t believe.

Don’t be disheartened, make the most of the opportunities coming your way, harness the power of your imagination because you people are going to need it when the information exchange really begins.

P. Francberg,
EuroNation,
2047 AD
(4,540,000,0047 ABB)

“10%, far more British than European.”
20-something, UK

“More so since I’ve been living in France. Being British is being European. I can’t feel one without feeling the other.”
20-something, British ex-pat in France

“I guess not much really, more Italian, never thought of myself as European.”
20-something, Italian ex-pat in France

“25%.”
20-something, UK

Geographically speaking, it’s easy to identify with being European; culturally speaking, the lines begin to blur. As a euro-translator this question of identity is often the subject of conversation, especially in this last bastion of euro-scepticism that I call home.

Living in Europe, the label is inescapable by default. However, choosing to consciously identify with the continent in political and cultural terms is a leap that few of us in the UK dare or care to make. Our country of birth usually being enough for most to cling to. Some go as far as calling themselves, “citizens of the world,” which could be considered more appealing than, “subject of the Queen,” but when it comes to defending the cultures that we were raised in for the sake of future generations it makes more sense to choose and the obvious answer is the place where we spent our childhood.

The future of Europe would appear to be inexorably approaching a form of super-state to rival the major powers in economic terms. Obvious barriers to efficiency may be linguistic and cultural, but these will be eroded with time as external pressures force cooperation. This could force the emergence of one European representative language, working practice and legal system.

Whether or not this would even ever happen is up to chaos theory to decide, but individual European national identity is a thing of the past. In two generations you’ll have to pay - in Euros - for your EuroNation identity card.