They are entirely free to not do labeling work.
They can't get their time and innocence back.
So everyone’s a victim now, eh?
Kenyan moderators decry toll of training of AI
81–90 of 91 posts
Re: Kenyan moderators decry toll of training of AI
#82Re: Kenyan moderators decry toll of training of AI
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
You would not take this option because you prefer living in the U.S. (or wherever) and being employed there, but that's not the relevant counterfactual for the people doing this work, and it seems like it's preferable to other options they actually have, else it would hardly attract workers. Don't get me wrong, companies have an obligation to guarantee some level of workplace safety and healthy conditions etc.! But a…
That Kenyan workers don't have more favorable counterfactuals for employment doesn't place companies' behavior beyond critique, because the (collective) behavior of companies that employ workers in Kenya is partially determinative of what the counterfactuals themselves are . If you fall off a bridge into a river and are drowning, and I'm the only person around, it's still exploitation if I try to make you promise to…
This is incoherent. If Kenyans don't have strong employment prospects then offering them jobs isn't "wrongfully exploiting the situation". It's the exact opposite: it is providing them employment prospects they'd otherwise lack.
The economic conditions in Kenya were not caused by 'centuries of exploitation' but by millennia of non-development.
Re: Kenyan moderators decry toll of training of AI
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
If a worker effectively performs the required tasks for $1.46/hr, this demonstrates the work's intrinsic value quite explicitly. The onus to make a higher wage to improve their lifestyle is on the individual, given the freedom they have to allocate their time as they see fit. It's not incumbent upon others or businesses to pay more for tasks if a lower-cost, higher-value solution exists.
> It's not incumbent upon others or businesses to pay more for tasks if a lower-cost, higher-value solution exists. in the US, we've collectively decided (through elections) that there should be a minimum wage, from which it follows that we've also decided that the "wages have no bottom" argument, i.e. they should be able to go as low as possible without limit, is unethical and detrimental to society.
The minimum wage is zero. 'Minimum wage' laws don't have anything to do with the actual minimum wage. They forbid employment at wages within a range between the minimum wage and a certain so-called 'minimum wage'. People that would otherwise be paid within that range instead get paid the actual minimum wage: nothing.
Re: Kenyan moderators decry toll of training of AI
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
One of them seems to have actually traumatic situations.
The potential harms of reviewing fucked up material even fictional are well attested. It's factored into law enforcement & child porn investigations and has been for years. I am assuming you knew that though, and just enjoyed this little moment of belittling someone for their suffering. Hope it was nice. Hope you're having the day you wanted to have.
I really don't know it, because I truly cannot imagine how text could cause trauma to a normal person in the position of a third-party. And I'm assuming normal here, because they decided to do it as a job.
Re: Kenyan moderators decry toll of training of AI
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
The potential harms of reviewing fucked up material even fictional are well attested. It's factored into law enforcement & child porn investigations and has been for years. I am assuming you knew that though, and just enjoyed this little moment of belittling someone for their suffering. Hope it was nice. Hope you're having the day you wanted to have.
I really don't know it, because I truly cannot imagine how text could cause trauma to a normal person in the position of a third-party. And I'm assuming normal here, because they decided to do it as a job.
They had no advance warning of what to expect:
The moderators say they weren’t adequately warned about the brutality of some of the text and images they would be tasked with reviewing, and were offered no or inadequate psychological support.
The 51 moderators in Nairobi working on Sama’s OpenAI account were tasked with reviewing texts, and some images, many depicting graphic scenes of violence, self-harm, murder, rape, necrophilia, child abuse, bestiality and incest, the petitioners say.
You're not alone, there's likely a higher than normal percentage of HN'rs that have difficulty imagining how other people react and feel.
Re: Kenyan moderators decry toll of training of AI
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
Buying/paying local helps my local economy.
I think there's times where this makes sense and times where it doesn't. Your local economy is probably better served by being paid to do something else. They probably have a comparative advantage at doing another activity. You'd be better off paying into your local economy where it makes strategic sense. We're not talking about exporting critical manufacturing skills here. We're talking about doing a crappy job that…
“We're not talking about exporting critical manufacturing skills here.”
True. Those critical skills have already been exported from the US.
Re: Kenyan moderators decry toll of training of AI
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you worked for Sama and was sent to work in Kenya, would you take a salary cut just because your cost of living has reduced? Pay people what they are worth, not based on where they choose to live.
> Pay people what they are worth There is no "what they are worth". There's competition for employees and what they can accept. The same force drives you being paid tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. That's not an abstract "what you're worth". They aren't being kind to you. They're just paying what you'll accept, exactly as they are paying those people what they would accept. Not to say companies couldn…
This is simplistic thinking. There is a reason there are minimum wage laws. While those rates are usually woefully low, there was a reason for them to be enacted.
Certainly we can agree that a person’s “worth” from a full-time job be able to live in an inexpensive 1 br apartment, pay utilities, afford medical care, eat healthy food and purchase basic hygienic items, transportation to work, maybe 1-2 weeks of vacation every year?
Re: Kenyan moderators decry toll of training of AI
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think there's times where this makes sense and times where it doesn't. Your local economy is probably better served by being paid to do something else. They probably have a comparative advantage at doing another activity. You'd be better off paying into your local economy where it makes strategic sense. We're not talking about exporting critical manufacturing skills here. We're talking about doing a crappy job that…
“We're not talking about exporting critical manufacturing skills here.” True. Those critical skills have already been exported from the US.
Yes, except for some higher end defense tech (minus semiconductor).
Re: Kenyan moderators decry toll of training of AI
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
Pretty much all this summarizes as "yes, it's valuable work to the individual". Broadly I agree - a lot of it is clearly a pretty big positive. But that doesn't make it not exploitative . For the same reasons that wealthy places don't generally allow child labor and have worker safety and environmental protections... but outsourced stuff frequently does not. The companies outsourcing are clearly aware of this, but mo…
> Pretty much all this summarizes as "yes, it's valuable work to the individual". Individuals are making up the societies. Few dozen of people working relatively high income, are lifting whole countries up - that's how globalization have worked. >But that doesn't make it not exploitative. For the same reasons that wealthy places don't generally allow child labor and have worker safety and environmental protections...…
No, I'm rather explicitly accusing them.
>most do or allow things that are blatantly illegal where they're headquartered.
Much of this would not be possible on a fair playing field. It happens because the companies outsourcing wield immensely disproportionate power, so they can get away with it. If "maybe we shouldn't let them kill people and dump the trash in their water supply" means slowing things down, I suspect it would be a net benefit, even after losing most of the positives it brings in.
I recognize it's complex and opinions differ, of course. Not claiming I alone am right or that my opinion won't change.