Jack Connor is a software engineer and linguist who has a lifelong fascination with languages. He spoke seven languages by the time he was 25.

This interest in language and technology led him to the world of artificial intelligence. He built many pieces of AI language technology and, in 2017, wrote a book on the future of language technology that successfully predicted many of the advancements since.

In 2023 he began the project to preserve endangered languages using Large Language Models. The world loses dozens of languages every year due to the increased dominance of major languages like English, Spanish, and Mandarin, and Jack found this loss sad and unacceptable.

He believes that losing a language was like losing an entire culture and history. So he began working to create fluent LLMs in endangered and underserved languages. That way, we can preserve them for future generations of speakers.

He decided to focus on preserving Navajo, as it’s a historically important language in the United States. It’s also fascinating linguistically, has an estimated 170,000 native speakers in the US, and is one of the oldest continuous cultures in North America.

With the help of OSV, he will preserve the Navajo language for humanity’s future, while creating a methodology for saving other endangered languages.