Ideas: Language technologies for everyone with Kalika Bali

The Microsoft Research Podcast series, Ideas, offers a glimpse into the beliefs and research experiences of members of the research community at Microsoft. In this episode, host Gretchen Huizinga sits down with Principal Researcher Kalika Bali to discuss the groundbreaking work she and her team are doing in language technology.

Bali's passion for linguistics and early vision of "talking computers" led her to merge the two fields, resulting in two decades of research that are changing the way language technology is developed and implemented. Using the latest advances in large language models, Bali and her team are creating language technology applications with the goal of making generative AI accessible to under-resourced and underserved language communities worldwide.

Projects such as Kahani: Visual Storytelling through Culturally Nuanced Images and Project VeLLM are just a few examples of the innovative work being done to create inclusive AI tools that cater to these communities. Bali and her team's vision is to ensure that language technology is readily available to everyone in their own language, and they're making it happen through their groundbreaking research.

To learn more about Bali's projects, check the links below:

• The State and Fate of Linguistic Diversity and Inclusion in the NLP World | Publication, July 2020
• Project VeLLM | Project page
• Kahani: Visual Storytelling | Project page
• Kahani: Visual Storytelling through Culturally Nuanced Images | Microsoft Research Forum | Episode 1, January 2024
• Teachers in India help Microsoft Research design AI tool for creating great classroom content | Microsoft Research blog, October 2023
• Digital Labor: Project Karya | Project page
• Village by village, creating the building blocks for AI tools with work that also educates | Microsoft Source Asia blog, February 2024

The podcast is available on platforms such as Spotify and offers insights into the technology industry to people from all walks of life.