Are we on the cusp of real-time translation?

The article I'm about to link to covers so much that I talk about in class, including neural networks, deep learning, artificial intelligence, real-time speech parsing for things like Siri, corpus analysis (evaluating large collections of text) and so on that it boggles the mind.

There are already a myriad of tools to help you convert one language into another in almost real time, including apps for iPhone, Android, and Windows. Something like that is very useful if you are, say, traveling and don't speak the local language.

Now, however, Microsoft is planning on releasing functionality in Skype that doesn't simply translate text, but will translate spoken conversation from one language to another in real time.

This may not seem like a big deal, but it could be very useful for obvious reasons, for example company meetings comprising employees from different countries, or medical consultations with specialists from around the world, or having a classroom comprised of students from all over. Or, for more mundane reasons, if you simply had friends whose native language was different from your own.

80+ schools around the world participating in Skype in the Classroom

Whatever the use, something like this would be a big step in further shrinking the world and removing a significant communication barrier that has always existed. The implications for this type of functionality are enormous.