Open meeting: Generative AI

Contribute to the discussion as ITI develops its response to generative AI within the language services sector.

Generative AI and other emerging technologies have been developing apace during recent months, resulting in considerable hype in the media. This has generated both a degree of pessimism, as well as more useful and considered thinking. A scan of recent articles in language services sector newsletters and social media suggests a growing consensus that the key issues for the language services sector are likely to centre on the following themes:

• The human is, and will continue to be, essential to ensuring high quality, accurate and ethical translation and interpreting outcomes
• The evolution and regulation of generative AI technologies is out of our control, but we might need to selectively challenge some developments
• New models of working could offer the potential for new commercial opportunities and diversification
• Much more content will (need to) be translated in the future
• The most skilled linguists will be in greatest demand i.e. commercial success will lie in specialisation rather than generalisation.

ITI is in the process of setting up a Working Group on AI but we also want to make use of members’ knowledge and experience to make sure that we have the best understanding of both the opportunities and threats to the translation and interpreting professions.

This open meeting is the first in a series of regular events that we will be running over the coming year.

Agenda

The topics that we will ask members to address in this first meeting are:

1. Preparing for the future
   • What might the profession look like in 5 years’ time?
   • Given the rapid evolution of generative AI and associated technologies, how do language professionals adapt to remain successful?
2. Developing our policy
   • Where might ITI have the most influence? Where do we have the power to create positive change for the profession?
   • What should we focus our limited resources on?