hey everyone marco montemagno here
digital domination summit with me Joseph
Don hi Joseph are you going alone are
you doing we just you know I’m going
around and I love when it is possible to
do an interview in person you know
because normally people they are
watching interviews on webcams and
remotely so it’s good to have you here
lucky live in London and beautiful
weather yeah amazing
really so Joseph tell me about this this
bubble bubble I was always a big fan of
bubbles from day one and you you are
changing this world of translations okay
so what whoops oh hello I didn’t I
predict that well yeah I happen I don’t
ready because I get the drugs well it’s
not again yeah a drunk man just
interrupt the interview and you
predicted yeah all right so what’s
happening with bubble burst in the
translation or but what does it mean so
I think favor verse is more like we want
to enable communication globally but we
just really about being able to
communicate with the world and they’re
all in your native language without
language barriers so it’s about breaking
down language barriers but also about
breaking down geographical barriers and
and you do it by having a network of
interpreters yeah right that’s right and
how many language could you translate
well yeah the network of interpreters
around the world currently between them
like the linguistical brain of the
interpreters they can speak between them
166 languages hundred between those but
that’s not the most interesting thing
like a more interesting thing is how
many combinations they write so like at
the moment our communities
speak almost a thousand combinations
alright so but to get to the universal
translator took be able to speak any
language combination globally we there
are almost twenty eight million
combinations we’re only on one thousand
so we have a long way grazie
yeah it’s about how many languages are
in the water I thought you know twenty
like yeah it’s amazing there are there
are almost seven thousand crazy and they
I mean the more like there are fifteen
hundred languages spoken by more than 1
million native speakers all right it’s a
lot of languages out there what one
question I think you know we have a lot
of business people watching the videos
and companies or entrepreneurs one of
her nerves and the point here is most of
the time you you create a content online
I think a video for instance like this
one we do a video and then if we want
this video translated ok here’s a
painting yes no user from my experience
fifteen years experience I know that is
painful in Italy yeah because you know
we do it in English tennis okay I want
any Italian good what should I do I get
transcripted then I get translation yeah
into Italian – you tell somebody to do
the subtitle yeah and then uploading and
then thinking that it is really painful
really painful so why Bob over should be
better than this approach I think that
favor verse is different because we
don’t do text we do voice so something
that baby words can do for video content
online is if you have a video and you
bring it on eBay worth platform we we do
interpretation so we have interpreters
which are highly skilled at simultaneous
interpretation so watching a piece of
video content okay 30 minutes and
interpreting life in real time over the
video so it’s a very fast way of
translating a video and there’s a story
about what work what we’re doing I tell
you a story
so like paper versus trying to work out
what do we call this new type of
interpretation because it’s not for the
conference
traditionally yeah it’s not for you know
a diplomatic meeting but it’s for video
content it’s about sharing knowledge as
quickly as possible
so I recently found out that in the
Soviet Union they the the Soviet Union
didn’t want their their citizens to be
watching video with our school films or
Hollywood movies they were dangerous
they were they were darkness so there
was underground interpreters okay that
used to record privately in a secret
room the very quickly the films they
used to narrate the films it was one
interpreter it wasn’t dubbing and it was
called something yeah it was called
garelu guerra love was the name of the
interpreter that was a bit of a mystery
to the sort of Soviets and he they used
to share the audio files right
blackmarket
so I think this is what they were versus
yeah to explain it you know we are any
content out there can be interpreted
very quickly well when I was younger I
was a table tennis player professional
table tennis player and the funny thing
is that a Swedish got the most famous
talent talented player in the history
the Mozart of table tennis for some
people if people passionate about table
tennis have no idea but that’s the
interesting part and I was watching a
documentary in Swedish and I was so
interested at that I finally watched all
the documentary in Swedish language I
could understand anything but the the
point here is that if you can have a
system that translate you know any
language in any language that will open
the possibilities so again is very
interesting like that that that system
that platform is just the power of
people so
all these you know there there are
people all around the world that
especially with this topic with
communication right with enabling
sharing of knowledge that want to share
want to help and want to be part of
something that is more like a movement
so our arms a bit like a movement so
people all around the world we have
thousands of people that as they grow
and grow and grow any video any audio
any content out there can be quickly
interpreted into another language done
and enjoyed yeah oh how far you are from
that vision I mean yeah how long it
takes to get there what do you think
yeah something about us like we we
started this company without actually
looking for an idea okay we don’t know
where the end is and we didn’t we don’t
even know where the beginning really was
because the beginning was probably 10
years ago you know you know in our minds
we always were interested in science
fiction
but the vision the vision of the
universal translator being able to
communicate in any language thing for us
it’s it’s it’s like a life project it’s
along a very long-term vision for us
they don’t gain we just there are there
are things like machine translation
algorithms that are improving but
there’s only a certain amount of data
that they can eat – you know
statistically – okay to be able to
you know we have yeah you have a long
road ahead yeah so it will be finally a
collaboration between algorithm and
human beings it might you know worse
future and see see what happens I hope
that I’ll be doing this for a very long
time okay
well last time we met you told me a very
interesting thing that I don’t remember
it was in Japan or in Asia somewhere
yeah there was this idea of a bubble
verse 2 or 4 guides or something like
that it was I think what was very
interesting how did it work yeah so it
was South Korea okay so it was something
that was in Korea if you speak any other
language other than Korean okay it’s
very hard to to communicate right and I
was there and I can say yes is yeah I
mean oh what is speaking you know so
like but in South Korea they had the
World Cup 2002 and the Minister of
Tourism needed a solution for all the
fans that were arriving in South Korea
to to get around the city it’s like to
be understood and he he came up with
something which was used volunteers in
Korea that can be on call like a
telephone this was before the internet
before you know for Twitter Facebook so
that when you land at the airport in
South Korea and if you anyone does go to
South Korea when you land at the airport
you can get a telephone I give you a
telephone that you can take around the
city take around Seoul you call a number
and you were connected to a volunteer so
somebody in one big thank you for you
you can get them on the telephone code
as like we went into a restaurant and we
ordered some food when we were in in
over there
and I also a simple thing like rice and
chicken it was a Sunday afternoon it was
four o’clock the the restaurants were
closed but there was a family restaurant
and they said you know coming coming now
say me and my oh yeah let’s sit down
everything was in in Korean there were
no pictures no not even any pictures and
we couldn’t we couldn’t explain what we
wanted
we just wanted simp something simple not
something cocaine and Korean food can be
complicated and spicy and and not sure
what you’re eating so you don’t know
what it is right but we use Google
Translate just to test you know we
product him all you want showed them
this and then they disappeared into the
kitchen and they brought back a bowl of
like soup with with side dishes that
look like the insides of an animal
probably were and then we said okay
right this didn’t work very well so
let’s use let’s call a person let’s use
the song hey and you used it every user
service we’ve got the person on the
telephone but we’d already ordered so
okay neat only needed to us what we had
what they had brought us no cable and it
worked very well and cool it was just
great to have somebody available yeah so
was inspiring also for a Bible verse for
done it is because it showed us that
something already exists and it began in
2002 and Milt’s 2012 we were there so
that was they had their 10 year
anniversary I wanted to use as about
marketing about promoting and I think
you always said some cool ideas about
how to promote bubble verse without you
know spending big budget because you
know your startup so you you can just
spend billions of dollars and you always
try to find a different way can you give
me some example of performance that you
did to promote bubble okay so some I
think yeah we we don’t do any direct
marketing we don’t do any Adwords
Facebook ads a daunting that’s to
approach that we should take because
we’re more we need to be more engaged
with the people that are part want to be
part of the movement okay
so we’re always looking for
opportunities where we can use bow of us
in the real world we’re not a stealth
startup
we’ve never been in hiding we have to
run completely transparent open you have
to be open
totally but 100 percent believe that you
have to put your face out there so
something that we did was we saw an
opportunity where we could use progress
in the real world which was when Obama
gave his State of the Union speech okay
he gave two gives a one-hour speech we
saw an opportunity where we could
broadcast his speech using our community
that we thought at the time into as many
languages as possible so we were in
Borno cyrus at the time in a small flat
me and my L my co-founder and we
released first of all press release
before we even had the product alright
but we only had 24 hours to build out
paint this interesting we are technical
founders right all right because we
wanted we were like okay let’s throw
this idea out there let’s put something
crazy so we do I think that the headline
was Babel verse will will interpret
Obama into 7,000 languages Wow okay okay
of course we were we would interpret him
into as many as we can okay can so you
know the time came the press took they
took the the bank and they wrote all the
the articles that they went out but the
point of the articles was that we needed
people to know about it so that they we
could have volunteers all right come
translating and translate okay and you
did it finally we did it I mean like
nine it was around nine p.m.
Obama was coming on stage but when I was
they make it live make it live like
let’s see what’s going to happen and and
they then they came and they carried on
come in and we had people volunteering
and interpreting Obama stayed over you
and live in 280 languages okay cool that
a eighty was our biggest operation there
yeah huge number
number so that was a success for us and
yeah to add one small thing about that
the best response we had was the
interpretation from English into
Mandarin all right because with these
type of things
President Obama giving his State of the
Union the world is interested in what
the US president has to say so also the
Chinese are interested in that obviously
what we broadcasted more into Mandarin
live okay so people in China
I like the idea you know that you just
try to find a different approach start
maybe from something that is in the news
and you jump on that bandwagon and and
try to get this without a product yeah
but do you know what we have we have a
passionate community of people yeah so
these people all around the world if you
if you give them a mission if you give
them a task yeah well they will follow
they will follow and they will help you
do it right yeah last question Josefina
and then I let you go back translate
traveling because Joseph is traveling so
much you know you throwing so much
you’re trying to slow down a bit
yeah yeah but by the way on this topic I
remember one of the best basketball
player in the history Kareem
abdul-jabbar was a basketball player
I remember in an interview they asked
him what was the most important thing
for you as a top player and he say the
most important thing is to rest because
when you rest you learn everything that
you did in your practice so I think yeah
you think you have to end there it’s
very important so yeah rest is very
important restless or rest is
underestimated yeah is one of the most
underestimated skill
last question what are the top three
apps I I asked this question to all the
digital donations have a speaker top
three apps on your mobile phone that you
recommend for a business use for the
business use yes okay and this is for
businessmen there are resourceful yeah
oh you you can choose you can choose
okay so there’s free apps that note
Angry Birds Angry Birds is not
cool out yeah yeah that you really use
and you think that I actually really use
so I hope in the idea of the sharing the
idea of that ownership is something that
we will do less and less of in my future
so ownership instead how can it be not
yet in my life but no more access and
less ownership yeah more access to took
more temporary access ok used to Airbnb
is an example of that are so something
data if you live the life that I live
which is a bit spontaneous and you don’t
know where you’ll be there’s an app that
I use which is hotel tonight hotel
tonight ok which is a great app that I
used in Berlin recently which it which
gives you access to very nice hotels
okay but you have to book it on the day
that on the day alright so
that that’s a very useful application
okay
so if you travel hotel tonight is a
great app and and if if you need to get
around the city when you’re in when
you’re through up when you’re in and
landing in a new city
I think there can I say two apps yeah
sure sure go together okay and there’s a
reason why I want to tell them but
there’s a great app in that came out of
San Francisco and maybe you saw the pink
mustache the car – yeah all right score
lift lip li ft this is a great app and
this is they this is a friend with a car
so it’s it’s like they reverse is a
friend that speaks all the languages of
the world okay this is a friend that can
get you from A to B in a city and it
works off of donations so you get in the
car these people are also vetted you
give them your date they take you from A
to B and then you give them a donation a
thank you you say right is five dollars
here’s six dollars is $15 K it’s all
based on donations and people that want
to help but then there’s something else
which is also an app which I want to
mention is uber is a very very very very
awesome gives you and that’s that yeah
on your on your phone all right
so but but the lift is like the the the
the sharing with a social mission social
mission an uber is more like the luxury
but they go together you have to put
them together because excellent Joseph
thank you so much yeah and don’t go off for everything Cheers
digital domination summit with me Joseph
Don hi Joseph are you going alone are
you doing we just you know I’m going
around and I love when it is possible to
do an interview in person you know
because normally people they are
watching interviews on webcams and
remotely so it’s good to have you here
lucky live in London and beautiful
weather yeah amazing
really so Joseph tell me about this this
bubble bubble I was always a big fan of
bubbles from day one and you you are
changing this world of translations okay
so what whoops oh hello I didn’t I
predict that well yeah I happen I don’t
ready because I get the drugs well it’s
not again yeah a drunk man just
interrupt the interview and you
predicted yeah all right so what’s
happening with bubble burst in the
translation or but what does it mean so
I think favor verse is more like we want
to enable communication globally but we
just really about being able to
communicate with the world and they’re
all in your native language without
language barriers so it’s about breaking
down language barriers but also about
breaking down geographical barriers and
and you do it by having a network of
interpreters yeah right that’s right and
how many language could you translate
well yeah the network of interpreters
around the world currently between them
like the linguistical brain of the
interpreters they can speak between them
166 languages hundred between those but
that’s not the most interesting thing
like a more interesting thing is how
many combinations they write so like at
the moment our communities
speak almost a thousand combinations
alright so but to get to the universal
translator took be able to speak any
language combination globally we there
are almost twenty eight million
combinations we’re only on one thousand
so we have a long way grazie
yeah it’s about how many languages are
in the water I thought you know twenty
like yeah it’s amazing there are there
are almost seven thousand crazy and they
I mean the more like there are fifteen
hundred languages spoken by more than 1
million native speakers all right it’s a
lot of languages out there what one
question I think you know we have a lot
of business people watching the videos
and companies or entrepreneurs one of
her nerves and the point here is most of
the time you you create a content online
I think a video for instance like this
one we do a video and then if we want
this video translated ok here’s a
painting yes no user from my experience
fifteen years experience I know that is
painful in Italy yeah because you know
we do it in English tennis okay I want
any Italian good what should I do I get
transcripted then I get translation yeah
into Italian – you tell somebody to do
the subtitle yeah and then uploading and
then thinking that it is really painful
really painful so why Bob over should be
better than this approach I think that
favor verse is different because we
don’t do text we do voice so something
that baby words can do for video content
online is if you have a video and you
bring it on eBay worth platform we we do
interpretation so we have interpreters
which are highly skilled at simultaneous
interpretation so watching a piece of
video content okay 30 minutes and
interpreting life in real time over the
video so it’s a very fast way of
translating a video and there’s a story
about what work what we’re doing I tell
you a story
so like paper versus trying to work out
what do we call this new type of
interpretation because it’s not for the
conference
traditionally yeah it’s not for you know
a diplomatic meeting but it’s for video
content it’s about sharing knowledge as
quickly as possible
so I recently found out that in the
Soviet Union they the the Soviet Union
didn’t want their their citizens to be
watching video with our school films or
Hollywood movies they were dangerous
they were they were darkness so there
was underground interpreters okay that
used to record privately in a secret
room the very quickly the films they
used to narrate the films it was one
interpreter it wasn’t dubbing and it was
called something yeah it was called
garelu guerra love was the name of the
interpreter that was a bit of a mystery
to the sort of Soviets and he they used
to share the audio files right
blackmarket
so I think this is what they were versus
yeah to explain it you know we are any
content out there can be interpreted
very quickly well when I was younger I
was a table tennis player professional
table tennis player and the funny thing
is that a Swedish got the most famous
talent talented player in the history
the Mozart of table tennis for some
people if people passionate about table
tennis have no idea but that’s the
interesting part and I was watching a
documentary in Swedish and I was so
interested at that I finally watched all
the documentary in Swedish language I
could understand anything but the the
point here is that if you can have a
system that translate you know any
language in any language that will open
the possibilities so again is very
interesting like that that that system
that platform is just the power of
people so
all these you know there there are
people all around the world that
especially with this topic with
communication right with enabling
sharing of knowledge that want to share
want to help and want to be part of
something that is more like a movement
so our arms a bit like a movement so
people all around the world we have
thousands of people that as they grow
and grow and grow any video any audio
any content out there can be quickly
interpreted into another language done
and enjoyed yeah oh how far you are from
that vision I mean yeah how long it
takes to get there what do you think
yeah something about us like we we
started this company without actually
looking for an idea okay we don’t know
where the end is and we didn’t we don’t
even know where the beginning really was
because the beginning was probably 10
years ago you know you know in our minds
we always were interested in science
fiction
but the vision the vision of the
universal translator being able to
communicate in any language thing for us
it’s it’s it’s like a life project it’s
along a very long-term vision for us
they don’t gain we just there are there
are things like machine translation
algorithms that are improving but
there’s only a certain amount of data
that they can eat – you know
statistically – okay to be able to
you know we have yeah you have a long
road ahead yeah so it will be finally a
collaboration between algorithm and
human beings it might you know worse
future and see see what happens I hope
that I’ll be doing this for a very long
time okay
well last time we met you told me a very
interesting thing that I don’t remember
it was in Japan or in Asia somewhere
yeah there was this idea of a bubble
verse 2 or 4 guides or something like
that it was I think what was very
interesting how did it work yeah so it
was South Korea okay so it was something
that was in Korea if you speak any other
language other than Korean okay it’s
very hard to to communicate right and I
was there and I can say yes is yeah I
mean oh what is speaking you know so
like but in South Korea they had the
World Cup 2002 and the Minister of
Tourism needed a solution for all the
fans that were arriving in South Korea
to to get around the city it’s like to
be understood and he he came up with
something which was used volunteers in
Korea that can be on call like a
telephone this was before the internet
before you know for Twitter Facebook so
that when you land at the airport in
South Korea and if you anyone does go to
South Korea when you land at the airport
you can get a telephone I give you a
telephone that you can take around the
city take around Seoul you call a number
and you were connected to a volunteer so
somebody in one big thank you for you
you can get them on the telephone code
as like we went into a restaurant and we
ordered some food when we were in in
over there
and I also a simple thing like rice and
chicken it was a Sunday afternoon it was
four o’clock the the restaurants were
closed but there was a family restaurant
and they said you know coming coming now
say me and my oh yeah let’s sit down
everything was in in Korean there were
no pictures no not even any pictures and
we couldn’t we couldn’t explain what we
wanted
we just wanted simp something simple not
something cocaine and Korean food can be
complicated and spicy and and not sure
what you’re eating so you don’t know
what it is right but we use Google
Translate just to test you know we
product him all you want showed them
this and then they disappeared into the
kitchen and they brought back a bowl of
like soup with with side dishes that
look like the insides of an animal
probably were and then we said okay
right this didn’t work very well so
let’s use let’s call a person let’s use
the song hey and you used it every user
service we’ve got the person on the
telephone but we’d already ordered so
okay neat only needed to us what we had
what they had brought us no cable and it
worked very well and cool it was just
great to have somebody available yeah so
was inspiring also for a Bible verse for
done it is because it showed us that
something already exists and it began in
2002 and Milt’s 2012 we were there so
that was they had their 10 year
anniversary I wanted to use as about
marketing about promoting and I think
you always said some cool ideas about
how to promote bubble verse without you
know spending big budget because you
know your startup so you you can just
spend billions of dollars and you always
try to find a different way can you give
me some example of performance that you
did to promote bubble okay so some I
think yeah we we don’t do any direct
marketing we don’t do any Adwords
Facebook ads a daunting that’s to
approach that we should take because
we’re more we need to be more engaged
with the people that are part want to be
part of the movement okay
so we’re always looking for
opportunities where we can use bow of us
in the real world we’re not a stealth
startup
we’ve never been in hiding we have to
run completely transparent open you have
to be open
totally but 100 percent believe that you
have to put your face out there so
something that we did was we saw an
opportunity where we could use progress
in the real world which was when Obama
gave his State of the Union speech okay
he gave two gives a one-hour speech we
saw an opportunity where we could
broadcast his speech using our community
that we thought at the time into as many
languages as possible so we were in
Borno cyrus at the time in a small flat
me and my L my co-founder and we
released first of all press release
before we even had the product alright
but we only had 24 hours to build out
paint this interesting we are technical
founders right all right because we
wanted we were like okay let’s throw
this idea out there let’s put something
crazy so we do I think that the headline
was Babel verse will will interpret
Obama into 7,000 languages Wow okay okay
of course we were we would interpret him
into as many as we can okay can so you
know the time came the press took they
took the the bank and they wrote all the
the articles that they went out but the
point of the articles was that we needed
people to know about it so that they we
could have volunteers all right come
translating and translate okay and you
did it finally we did it I mean like
nine it was around nine p.m.
Obama was coming on stage but when I was
they make it live make it live like
let’s see what’s going to happen and and
they then they came and they carried on
come in and we had people volunteering
and interpreting Obama stayed over you
and live in 280 languages okay cool that
a eighty was our biggest operation there
yeah huge number
number so that was a success for us and
yeah to add one small thing about that
the best response we had was the
interpretation from English into
Mandarin all right because with these
type of things
President Obama giving his State of the
Union the world is interested in what
the US president has to say so also the
Chinese are interested in that obviously
what we broadcasted more into Mandarin
live okay so people in China
I like the idea you know that you just
try to find a different approach start
maybe from something that is in the news
and you jump on that bandwagon and and
try to get this without a product yeah
but do you know what we have we have a
passionate community of people yeah so
these people all around the world if you
if you give them a mission if you give
them a task yeah well they will follow
they will follow and they will help you
do it right yeah last question Josefina
and then I let you go back translate
traveling because Joseph is traveling so
much you know you throwing so much
you’re trying to slow down a bit
yeah yeah but by the way on this topic I
remember one of the best basketball
player in the history Kareem
abdul-jabbar was a basketball player
I remember in an interview they asked
him what was the most important thing
for you as a top player and he say the
most important thing is to rest because
when you rest you learn everything that
you did in your practice so I think yeah
you think you have to end there it’s
very important so yeah rest is very
important restless or rest is
underestimated yeah is one of the most
underestimated skill
last question what are the top three
apps I I asked this question to all the
digital donations have a speaker top
three apps on your mobile phone that you
recommend for a business use for the
business use yes okay and this is for
businessmen there are resourceful yeah
oh you you can choose you can choose
okay so there’s free apps that note
Angry Birds Angry Birds is not
cool out yeah yeah that you really use
and you think that I actually really use
so I hope in the idea of the sharing the
idea of that ownership is something that
we will do less and less of in my future
so ownership instead how can it be not
yet in my life but no more access and
less ownership yeah more access to took
more temporary access ok used to Airbnb
is an example of that are so something
data if you live the life that I live
which is a bit spontaneous and you don’t
know where you’ll be there’s an app that
I use which is hotel tonight hotel
tonight ok which is a great app that I
used in Berlin recently which it which
gives you access to very nice hotels
okay but you have to book it on the day
that on the day alright so
that that’s a very useful application
okay
so if you travel hotel tonight is a
great app and and if if you need to get
around the city when you’re in when
you’re through up when you’re in and
landing in a new city
I think there can I say two apps yeah
sure sure go together okay and there’s a
reason why I want to tell them but
there’s a great app in that came out of
San Francisco and maybe you saw the pink
mustache the car – yeah all right score
lift lip li ft this is a great app and
this is they this is a friend with a car
so it’s it’s like they reverse is a
friend that speaks all the languages of
the world okay this is a friend that can
get you from A to B in a city and it
works off of donations so you get in the
car these people are also vetted you
give them your date they take you from A
to B and then you give them a donation a
thank you you say right is five dollars
here’s six dollars is $15 K it’s all
based on donations and people that want
to help but then there’s something else
which is also an app which I want to
mention is uber is a very very very very
awesome gives you and that’s that yeah
on your on your phone all right
so but but the lift is like the the the
the sharing with a social mission social
mission an uber is more like the luxury
but they go together you have to put
them together because excellent Joseph
thank you so much yeah and don’t go off for everything Cheers
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