Yeah, you seem to remember correctly. Apparently, it just didn't reached its "public beta" until 2006 so that's when they date it's beginning.

https://translatepress.com/history-of-google-translate/

I’m guessing it may have been available in 2004 in some form but the official launch seems to been in 2006 so the quote seems accurate.

Technically true but misleading. translate.google.com was launched in beta in 2001. But it took until 2005ish to convince Larry and Sergey that "Google Translate" was a better name than "translate.google.com". They had a lot of strong ideas about branding but never did think of a better name. Source: I wrote translate.google.com starting in 2000. Sergey told me it would take "a couple months" when I was hired. Also the Wayback machine shows a version from August 2002 so you don't have to trust a rando on the internet. I entirely agree that it wasn't any good until I handed it off to people who actually knew what they were doing.

There are so many little nuggets like this in Hitchhiker's. It's why it's one of those pieces of art you can go back to time and again.

On a similar note i heard someone say it's lucky they need so many translators at the UN otherwise they might actually get things done!

Can you elaborate on your position? To me the opposite is far more obvious: the Internet has enabled people from all over the world to meet, learn from each other, become friends. "The Russians/Chinese/whatever" are no longer just a faceless group of people who are trying to take over the world - they're the person you worked with a few years ago, the friend you've played games with for years, the open source developer you've been collaborating with.