8.02.2010

I cookie likes

Okay apparently Google translate sucks.  Maybe it works between languages that follow similar grammatical structure, but English to Japanese requires a little more intelligence than merely translating each word separately and stringing them together.  My friend told me "私のようなクッキー" and I immediately thought "Google fails" and "she likes cookies." The literal translation is "a cookie like me," since of course it translated each word separately to achieve this nonsense: 私: I/me, のような: like (in the comparison sense, not the preference sense), and okay, well it at least caught the rest correctly.  The correct way of saying "I like cookies" is "私はクッキーが好き," which, if you just look at it as a string of words the Google way, translates to "I am cookie like." Turns out you have to type in "I cookie(s) likes" in order for Google to understand that like is used as a verb and to coerce the correct ordering.  ::Ramble over::

p.s. via Loren http://laughingsquid.com/wp-content/uploads/cookie-monster-20080603-133713.jpg
p.p.s. also reminds me of this http://triketora.tumblr.com/post/158012681/feynman-google-translation-equilibrium-via