HomeMeta Unveils Program to Advance AI Speech and Translation Models
Meta, in collaboration with UNESCO, has launched a new initiative to gather speech recordings and transcriptions. The company states this data will advance the development of openly accessible AI technologies.
Through its Language Technology Partner Program, Meta is seeking collaborators who can provide over 10 hours of speech recordings with transcriptions, substantial written text, and collections of translated sentences in diverse languages. Partners will collaborate with Meta's AI teams to incorporate these languages into the company's speech recognition and translation models. Once completed, these models will be released as open source.
The government of Nunavut, a remote territory in Northern Canada, is among the initial partners. Many residents of Nunavut speak Inuit languages, collectively referred to as Inuktut.
"Our efforts are particularly aimed at supporting underserved languages, aligning with UNESCO's mission," Meta explained in a blog post shared with TechCrunch. "Our ultimate objective is to build intelligent systems capable of understanding and responding to complex human needs, irrespective of language or cultural background."
In addition to this program, Meta is releasing an open source machine translation benchmark designed to evaluate the performance of language translation models. This benchmark, which includes sentences developed by linguists, supports seven languages and is available on the AI development platform Hugging Face, where contributions are also welcome.
While Meta presents these initiatives as philanthropic, the company will also gain from enhanced speech-recognition and translation capabilities.
Meta continues to increase the number of languages supported by its AI assistant, Meta AI, and is testing features like automatic translation for content creators. Last September, the company began trialing a tool for translating speech in Instagram Reels, enabling creators to dub their audio with automated lip-syncing.
Techcrunch event Exhibit at TechCrunch Sessions: AI
Reserve your exhibit space at TC Sessions: AI and present your innovations to over 1,200 decision-makers—without a major financial commitment. This offer is available until May 9, or while tables remain.
Exhibit at TechCrunch Sessions: AI
Reserve your exhibit space at TC Sessions: AI and present your innovations to over 1,200 decision-makers—without a major financial commitment. This offer is available until May 9, or while tables remain.
Berkeley, CA | June 5 BOOK NOW Meta's handling of non-English content on its platforms has faced significant criticism. A report indicated that Facebook failed to flag nearly 70% of COVID-related misinformation in Italian and Spanish, compared to just 29% of similar English-language misinformation. Furthermore, leaked internal documents show that posts in Arabic are frequently misidentified as hate speech.
Meta has stated it is implementing measures to enhance its translation and content moderation systems.
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Meta, in collaboration with UNESCO, has launched a new initiative to gather speech recordings and transcriptions. The company states this data will advance the development of openly accessible AI technologies.
Through its Language Technology Partner Program, Meta is seeking collaborators who can provide over 10 hours of speech recordings with transcriptions, substantial written text, and collections of translated sentences in diverse languages. Partners will collaborate with Meta's AI teams to incorporate these languages into the company's speech recognition and translation models. Once completed, these models will be released as open source.
The government of Nunavut, a remote territory in Northern Canada, is among the initial partners. Many residents of Nunavut speak Inuit languages, collectively referred to as Inuktut.
"Our efforts are particularly aimed at supporting underserved languages, aligning with UNESCO's mission," Meta explained in a blog post shared with TechCrunch. "Our ultimate objective is to build intelligent systems capable of understanding and responding to complex human needs, irrespective of language or cultural background."
In addition to this program, Meta is releasing an open source machine translation benchmark designed to evaluate the performance of language translation models. This benchmark, which includes sentences developed by linguists, supports seven languages and is available on the AI development platform Hugging Face, where contributions are also welcome.
While Meta presents these initiatives as philanthropic, the company will also gain from enhanced speech-recognition and translation capabilities.
Meta continues to increase the number of languages supported by its AI assistant, Meta AI, and is testing features like automatic translation for content creators. Last September, the company began trialing a tool for translating speech in Instagram Reels, enabling creators to dub their audio with automated lip-syncing.
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