Google intends to offer its services in 1000 languages

Google announced on Wednesday that it wanted to build an artificial intelligence model that would eventually make it possible to offer its Internet services in the world’s 1,000 most widely spoken languages.

“Imagine a new internet user in Africa who speaks Wolof (…) and who uses his phone to ask where the nearest pharmacy is or on which channel the African Cup football match is broadcast,” explained Johan Schalkwyk, researcher at Google .

“Ce sont des situations qu’on prend pour acquises. Mais elles sont loin d’être accessible à all dans le monde”, at-il ajouté lors d’une présentation aux journalistes sur les dernières innovations du groupe en matière d’ artificial intelligence .

Extended services for all audiences

There are more than 7,000 languages ​​in the world, but Google, for example, only offers its translation tool for just over 130 of them. The Californian company has technological advances to build its new artificial intelligence model, such as the possibility of working not only from texts available on the Internet, but also from videos, images and words.

The group also seeks to collect a wide range of audio excerpts from the various communities, especially for languages ​​for which there is not necessarily much writing. As the multi-year project progresses, Google plans to integrate its progress into its products, including YouTube, its digital keyboards and its translation tool, to make it easier to use services available online in the Internet’s native language. users and enable them to find relevant content.

AI to prevent natural disasters

Among the other advances made possible by artificial intelligence, Google has also developed tools that allow, based on satellite images, to identify and monitor forest fires in real time. The company then makes this information available on Google Maps and its search engine, helping to alert people to the danger and help emergency services predict how fires may evolve and spread.

This service is now available in the United States, Canada, Mexico, and parts of Australia. The initiative builds on a project launched in 2017 to help warn people about possible flooding, which last year sent 155 million notifications to 23 million people in India and Bangladesh.

Google announced on Wednesday that this service has been extended to 18 additional countries, in South America, Asia and Africa.