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Facebook moderators break NDAs to expose working conditions

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Re: Facebook moderators break NDAs to expose working conditions

#571

Post by nojvek »

Spooky23 wrote: post #541
ummwhat wrote: post #492

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've talked about this somewhere else. What you're seeing is just a manifestation of what I call "the fundamental problem of user created content." Said problem is that warehousing and distributing content scales insanely well but curation does not. Until we have strong AI, curation is a manual process. Moderators just aren't efficient enough at processing content for their output to pay for a full time salary. You c…

It’s fundamental that some members of the public are problems. By prohibiting the content but keeping the people around, they are curating a culture where predators are allowed to roam on the platform as long as they don’t cross a specific line. They do this because acknowledging and dealing with bad users would also mean impacting fake users that make them money with ad fraud, growth metrics and ginning up engagemen…

I don’t get the point of animal torture videos. The asking of meat consumed in the world is ludicrous. Eating meat is supporting animal torture in a way.

Just saying.

Re: Facebook moderators break NDAs to expose working conditions

#572

Post by Barrin92 »

invalidOrTaken wrote: post #526
Pigo wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how an average person could be expected to witness some of the things mentioned in the article. I didn't have time to read the entire article, but do they have counselors on staff or something? That one paragraph about organs was enough to ruin my day, and it was just text. I'm surprised such a "rash of videos" wasn't in the news somewhere.

>I don't see how an average person could be expected to witness some of the things mentioned in the article. I'm no fan of Facebook, but in their defense, this is sort of the point.

Well it still is their responsibility. It's like Dr Frankenstein letting the monster lose on the village and then going "hey guys well I sure don't know how to figure this stuff out".

If the government, the military, academia, the police or anyone else would let their inventions lose on the world in the manner the private sector does and leaves it to us to figure out how to clean up the mess we'd call them insane and demand them to be shut down within a week.

Re: Facebook moderators break NDAs to expose working conditions

#573

Post by xnyan »

closeparen wrote: post #553
xnyan wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry for the discourse, my polisci past is flaring up but I do in fact explain why I support this (silly) tweet. There are some kinds of nonviolent behavior we don't allow because we (I guess we is majority of society?) think it's wrong, often around issues of financial exploitation. For example, even if you are mentally sound you can't sell yourself into indentured servitude because that tends to only happen when s…

Why would it need to be law? Since, in your view, capital / management / entrepreneurship contribute nothing of value, workers should have no problem creating successful businesses without them. Particularly if UBI takes care of basic needs during the early stages.

Why do feel the need to misrepresent my argument? When did I say that management contributes nothing of value? Of all the arguments I was expecting, this one surprises me as it makes no sense.

Capitalism works on leveraging advantage to pay workers less than the value that they create. Do you have anything to say about that, or are you going to continue to suggest magic discount coupons (UBI) which are worth less than the value a worker creates are something besides slavery with extra steps?

Feel free to scoff/mock me for questioning sacred holy capitalism - when immoral ideals are questioned and no logical answer is available, history tells us emotion and feelings are the standard responses.

Re: Facebook moderators break NDAs to expose working conditions

#574

Post by xnyan »

Spooky23 wrote: post #545
ralusek wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That literally describes the problem though. There are too many people that can do that job, so there's a surplus supply for it to be valuable to the market. It isn't the responsibilities of the Scrooges and the Facebooks to account for the fact that there isn't enough demand for that position for it to pay well. If people are unable to find work, or are otherwise unable to have enough stability so as to avoid exploi…

Do you know what a Victorian-era workhouse is?

If someone suffered more than you, your suffering is invalid - is that your argument? Trying to understand what you are arguing.

Re: Facebook moderators break NDAs to expose working conditions

#575

Post by TaylorAlexander »

deusofnull wrote: post #443
anon029102 wrote: post #48

Guy Rosen and other execs within Integrity team continually skirt their responsibilities here. They claim they're doing better, but the second-order effects of crappy work conditions and demands keep cropping up. Zuck says one day we will hopefully be able to AI-away this integrity work (especially the most traumatizing), but he does not say a whisper as to improving working conditions or pay while the work needs to…

You're right, Facebook is a broken company. Along that point, we should break it up.

Break it up or just stop using it?

Re: Facebook moderators break NDAs to expose working conditions

#576

Post by jm4 »

baroffoos wrote: post #556
jm4 wrote: post #398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not following this logic. They can't quit a job that pays double minimum wage unless minimum wage is increased to the amount they are currently getting paid? If minimum wage was $15 there would be some other crummy employer paying more than minimum wage to incentivize people to take a shitty job. Would they be stuck in that one too because the alternatives pay less?

If it was possible to live a normal life on the minimum wage then many would chose to instead of destroying their mental health to be able to pay rent.

Choose to do the bare minimum because we change the system to make it comfortable enough? That’s a good idea.

I’m not necessarily against raising minimum wage. It should probably be reviewed and adjusted more often than it is. But wouldn’t we be better off with a system where people are incentivized to do more than the bare minimum? I don’t think minimum wage should be intended to be the baseline for a comfortable life. It should be high enough that people want to work in the first place rather than take handouts but not so high that it’s an opportunity to stagnate. Frankly, minimum wage is for first time workers and people who have zero marketable job skills or some other issue that prevents them from doing more productive work. Most people can achieve much more with a little work experience.

Re: Facebook moderators break NDAs to expose working conditions

#577

Post by GoodJokes »

cldellow wrote: post #12

This was a valuable article to read. Facebook is enormously valuable. They made something like $15B in net income in the last four quarters. Content moderators are a necessary condition for that profit. If kiddie porn, gore and animal cruelty flooded the network, it would cease to be a destination visited by people that advertisers will pay to reach. And yet, there are two sets of entry-level knowledge workers at Fac…

Are you telling companies exploit labor? Are you telling me meritocracy is a joke? Are you telling me a ton of software devs get paid WAY too much and aren’t that “special.” I think we have hit the nail on the headddddd

Re: Facebook moderators break NDAs to expose working conditions

#578

Post by dragonsky67 »

ralusek wrote: post #296
Lewton wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If it's a shit job that isn't worth the pay, people won't do it. That is not how the labor market works... At all. "Worth the pay" is overridden by "absolutely need this money for me or my kids to survive"

I responded to another poster. Desperation (debatable regarding whether or not this is possible in the United States) breaks markets, sure, but that doesn't mean that they suddenly need to be micromanaged. I have long been in favor of UBI in order to remove desperation from the table. I'm not, however, in favor of micromanaging roles at companies and arbitrarily determining what they're worth.

I've seen desperation in Australia, and our social welfare is head and shoulders above the US. US$30,000 would revolutionise many peoples lives. They would put up with a lot of crap to get that type of money.

Re: Facebook moderators break NDAs to expose working conditions

#579

Post by [deleted] »

xnyan wrote: post #573
closeparen wrote: post #553

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would it need to be law? Since, in your view, capital / management / entrepreneurship contribute nothing of value, workers should have no problem creating successful businesses without them. Particularly if UBI takes care of basic needs during the early stages.

Why do feel the need to misrepresent my argument? When did I say that management contributes nothing of value? Of all the arguments I was expecting, this one surprises me as it makes no sense. Capitalism works on leveraging advantage to pay workers less than the value that they create. Do you have anything to say about that, or are you going to continue to suggest magic discount coupons (UBI) which are worth less tha…

[deleted]
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