Auto-Translate Languages on Steam

[FreeMediaKids!]

Recently, I have noticed that discussions are in foreign languages, such as Spanish and Russian. I love how they share their own ideas which concern some topics, but I just don't know what they are saying.

Surely, I could use Google Translate to help me with what "on earth!" they are saying, but that is just a pain to do that over and over and eventually becomes tiresome, so I am suggesting an idea that there would be a press-to-auto-translate button where, Steam will automatically detect a language which is in a different text when loading a page, determine in what language it is, and ask whether or not to translate it just as Google translate foreign pages.

I don't know. Maybe, there is no point for it, but it may show some value. What do you think?

[depota kamo tanan (4u)]

The Discussions have forums for any other languages. The users are just mistaken in posting their concerns in the English forum.

[ArchHeal]

Check this I agree it is one sweet idea BUT you have to understand steam wont do anything about it as it will consume more bandwidth to the servers, which is not what any company would want. How ever I would have liked it as well, ever so more if it worked in game like Dota2 then I could talk to them Russians :)

[Dusk of Oolacile]

This would just encourage users to post in the wrong place. Auto-moving threads to the correct language forum would make more sense. (Along with an infraction system.)

[p0sixkillah [inactive]]

Originally posted by f0rU:

The Discussions have forums for any other languages. The users are just mistaken in posting their concerns in the English forum.

This.

Originally posted by LOLCAT:

This would just encourage users to post in the wrong place. Auto-moving threads to the correct language forum would make more sense. (Along with an infraction system.)

And actually this.

While I can't come up with a possible scenario of user posting something in Russian or Chinese along with English, I'm still against any automatic processes here. Let either users have a special "wrong forum" button or simply don't show English forums unless a user has English set as their Steam language. Can be the same with game hubs: show only those topics that are in your language.

[Fox]

Originally posted by iamtheking:

While I can't come up with a possible scenario of user posting something in Russian or Chinese along with English, I'm still against any automatic processes here. Let either users have a special "wrong forum" button or simply don't show English forums unless a user has English set as their Steam language. Can be the same with game hubs: show only those topics that are in your language.

The button you mentioned already exists : it's the report button.
To be honest, I'd be against your "don't show english threads unless you're English" : my Steam language is far from being English, yet I deem myself able to participate in the English section. An end-user filter would make more sense, even if misdetections can happen when titles are not perfectly written.

Originally posted by gamingforfun365:

Recently, I have noticed that discussions are in foreign languages, such as Spanish and Russian. I love how they share their own ideas which concern some topics, but I just don't know what they are saying.

Surely, I could use Google Translate to help me with what "on earth!" they are saying, but that is just a pain to do that over and over and eventually becomes tiresome, so I am suggesting an idea that there would be a press-to-auto-translate button where, Steam will automatically detect a language which is in a different text when loading a page, determine in what language it is, and ask whether or not to translate it just as Google translate foreign pages.

I don't know. Maybe, there is no point for it, but it may show some value. What do you think?

My main grip on it is about answering.

Sure, knowing what people say would be useful, but bear in mind that language is far more than simple words. Grammar differences (or errors), slang, spelling errors (and SMS talk, ridden with errors), and sometimes intent (I think along the line of irony, which seems to not translate well in all languages), will all contribute to throw the translator off and produce you a far-from-perfect translation.

This is all fine and dandy until you want to participate (say, if someone asked for help instead) : either it's not autotranslated and people may be quite puzzled by the foreign language, or it's autotranslated and it may look like garbage.

I, sadly, have no idea to mitigate the issue, other than a notification at the bottom of said answer : "This user has set this language to be automatically translated".