Have you ever looked at the services provided by a translation agency and noticed transcription services? In the Past If transcription hadn’t been used to record events in history, we’d have little knowledge of the past and what went on. Transcription puts language into writing to provide a written record. Writing is said to have begun around 5,000 years ago, in Mesopotamia and it was used to keep lists and records of accounts and taxes. In ancient Egypt, Scribes were used to record events using hieroglyphics. The Phoenicians and the Greeks developed an alphabet and eventually Latin was adopted by Europeans. Technology Transcription services nowadays, aren’t much different from the past, except technology has made sure it is more accurate. Transcription in fields such as medicine and law began at the beginning of the 20th century, when transcribers working for transcription companies would listen to voice recordings through a set of headphones and would have to put up with loud speech, background noise or someone talking too fast or too slowly. During the 1960’s and 70’s, advances in technology meant that machinery became smaller. People began to make use of voice recordings for the purposes of work related projects, using a transcriptionist to type up their work so there was also a written record. Transcription Today Nowadays, digital transcription means the use of computers and smart phones and many professional transcribers use software tools to help with their work. For example, the speed and the volume of the speech can be altered, or background noise can be reduced, which will make the tape clearer and easy to work from. Audio transcription is used in many different fields. Accountants, journalists, doctors, researchers, corporate speakers, writers and insurance companies are just some of the clients a professional transcriber will have on their books. Language Insight Services Language Insight is a translation company which offers a transcription service. If you would like to know more about transcription, please get in touch by giving us a call, or sending an email. We also deal with localisation, transcreation and interpreting services, as well as desk top publishing. Find out more here.
