The work used digital platforms to make an AI-translated political speech available almost simultaneously with the official broadcast.

The traditional Christmas address is held every year by the Federal President of Germany and is one of the most important political speeches throughout the year. In 2023 the Christmas address was held for the 100th time.

Germany is a multicultural and multilingual country – more than one in four citizens has a migrant background. More than half of them speak either no German or mainly another language at home. Their inclusion becomes a huge challenge as the country still lacks inclusiveness in many areas like political speeches for example. Open to Diversity, a non-profit democracy initiative from Germany, aimed to change that.

Open to Diversity celebrated the 100th anniversary of the traditional Christmas address with a simple AI hack to ensure that the highly symbolic speech reached more people than ever before, turning it into a symbol of a diverse Germany.

On 25 December 2023 at 7.10 pm, the speech by Germany’s Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier was broadcast on national TV. Meanwhile, an AI recreated the recording with the 12 most commonly spoken languages in Germany.

First the wordings of the speech were translated before adapting them to the Federal President’s linguistic style and even matching his lip movement, in order to create the most realistic depiction possible. Shortly after the speech was over, the AI-generated results were made available on social media and linked to a microsite.