Talking translation
Tech Life
BBC
4.4 • 221 Ratings
🗓️ 2 September 2025
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
We test the AI tech that offers live language translation on the telephone. India bans online money games. And AI in the workplace - a global study looks at who uses it, and why.
Presenter: Shiona McCallum Producer: Tom Quinn
(Image: A photo of a young woman speaking into a smartphone. Credit: pocketlight/Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I'm Rory Stewart and I grew up wanting to be a hero and I'm still fascinated by the ideas of heroism. |
| 0:08.9 | In my new series, I'm taking in the long sweep of history from Achilles to Zelensky and asking, what is a hero? |
| 0:16.2 | Simply doing your job, being a decent human being. |
| 0:20.0 | A true hero is someone who just kind of shines by |
| 0:23.1 | their own light and that light is to be recognised by others. The long history of heroism with me, |
| 0:28.7 | Rory Stewart. Listen on BBC Sounds. Hello and welcome to TechLife on the BBC World Service, |
| 0:37.0 | the programme about technology and how it affects your life. |
| 0:41.2 | I'm Shona McCallum. This week, will calling abroad ever be the same again? We'll be testing the AI that offers live language translation on the telephone. |
| 0:51.3 | A government crackdown on betting bans all online games in India involving money. |
| 0:56.9 | Our correspondent in Delhi has the latest. And more AI, this time at work. Would it make your job |
| 1:03.4 | easier? And are you allowed to use it? I talk to an expert about how the tech is being adopted. |
| 1:35.3 | Thank you. an expert about how the tech is being adopted. Let's start today by talking in English about how tech can potentially help us communicate in other languages. |
| 1:40.9 | There are various tech translation tools out there, but Google has launched a smartphone, which the company says breaks down language barriers during phone calls. |
| 1:46.0 | The Pixel 10 features built-in AI that can translate conversations in real time, even mimicking |
| 1:52.0 | each person's voice, allowing callers who speak different languages to communicate more naturally. |
| 1:58.1 | We'll find out what a real human translator makes of it shortly, but first |
| 2:02.2 | TechLife's Liv McMan has joined me here in the studio. Hi Liv. Hi, Jonah. Now, Google supplied you |
| 2:08.2 | with a pixel 10 phone for you to do this test. Tell us about the live voice translation feature. |
| 2:14.1 | So live translation for phone calls is among a slew of AI features that Google's |
| 2:18.2 | sort to cram into its new phones. It's designed to let someone with a pixel 10 make and have |
| 2:23.3 | calls in English, as well as in 10 other languages, including Hindi, Russian and Indonesian that can be |
| 2:28.9 | translated in real time to another user. The feature also tries to match how a person would sound speaking in a different |
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