Ortsbo Partners and Investors, Gene Simmons (left) and Paul Stanley (right), onstage with Eric Singer and Tommy Thayer. Photo by Anton Olsen
The Internet is making the world a whole lot smaller as bandwidth starts to appear in the least likely places. Sure, there are plenty of holes, but most, if not all, of the people I know are connected real-time or near real-time through social media or instant messenger. Even if they don’t have a solid internet connection they can usually sip the data stream through text messages.
After distance, I believe that language is the last barrier to instant world-wide communications. Sure, most of us have tried machine translations, especially Google’s, with limited success. But little has been done for accurate realtime translation. The few applications and services that I have tried allow me to get the point across, but failed miserably with any slang or colloquialisms. Often times with embarrassing results.
Ortsbo has set out to attack the language barrier with a suite of tools that provide accurate and instant translations of natural language text. They have created a few apps to showcase the abilities of their translator, including web and mobile apps, social media tools, and real-time voice to subtitle translation. I ran a few tests with some friends who are fluent in Spanish, and the results were impressive. We didn’t have to work hard to find holes, but overall it conveyed the meaning with reasonably accurate grammar.
I talked with David Lucatch recently about the service and he said it was initially developed for software programmers who work across time zones and country borders. That is all changing though as they expand and explore new markets, including social media, business to business and business to consumer communications.
David also talked at length about their new service, the Social Hub. This is the product that I think has the most potential, and from what I have already seen is a great way for anyone with a social presence to connect their audience together across language barriers. The first example of the Social Hub was launched by the band Kiss earlier this month as they kicked off The Tour. Lucatch mentioned a deal with Live Nation to aggregate and translate social media for more tours and bands but could not yet announce any names.
Ortsbo recently provided their live subtitling and translation services to the Indycar Series for a real-time question and answer session with three Indycar drivers, Graham Rahal, Josef Newgarden, and Takuma Sato. The video was webcast live with questions and answers subtitled in the viewers native language. Viewers also had the ability to submit questions in their native language.
Two of Ortso’s partners are Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley of the legendary rock band, Kiss. I recently sat down with both of them to talk about Ortsbo, social media, and fans.
Gene had this to say about Ortsbo and the fan experience in general: “What this is really is about is trying to increase the experience of the fans. Social media is another way to get closer to the fans, to let them have much more direct contact with us. It is more than music, it is culture. When you are tweeting about the event, it is less about the [technical details] and more about saying I was there and did you see me? All of this gets the fans inside, closer to whatever it is they are talking about. So for us, using Ortsbo is a way to increase the experience that the fans are having. To make it easy for the fan to experience whatever it is they are looking for. The experience shouldn’t end or begin at the show. Before, during, and after the show the fans can connect regardless of language.”
Gene went on to demonstrate the Ortsbo 2Go app on his iPhone while he emphasized that for him and the band it is about connecting the fans and extending the Kiss experience as far as possible.
Paul emphasized much of what Gene had to say, and added: “It’s really just a no-brainer. The smaller you can make the world, the more you make it a global village and the better off we all are. It’s all about time. If we can find a way to do things in real-time we can connect that much better with our fans worldwide. An analogy is putting on 24 hour television now and seeing events unfold around the world. Ortsbo is just a way to create a common language so that people can communicate without the language barrier in realtime. Then the possibilities are endless.”
Paul went on to talk about how Ortsbo excels at communicating the intent across languages and how powerful of a tool that is.
After the interview my wife and I took a quick tour backstage before finding our seats for the show. Paul and Gene were both right, and for Kiss it is really is about the show and the experience. Connecting with the fans is how Kiss made it big with their release of Alive! in 1975 and it is how they are still selling out large venue shows across the nation nearly 40 years later. Tools like Ortsbo’s Social Hub are how they plan to stay connected going forward.
You can find out a lot more about Ortsbo, including links to their web and mobile apps on their website at Ortsbo.com.
