N.Y. MTA pilots foreign-language Web translator

To improve communication with its foreign language-speaking customers, the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) is piloting an automatic translator on its Website www.mta.info. The "WorldLingo" automated translation program will translate a Web page into 12 different languages: French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Greek, Japanese, Korean, simplified Chinese or traditional Chinese. The translator program provides a literal, word-by-word translation of the English-language text. The MTA pilot translation program will track usage over the next six months to evaluate the success of the translation engine.