This is very typical for Upwork. I have entirely stopped using their platform.
Data scientists shouldn't use Upwork
31–40 of 160 posts
Re: Data scientists shouldn't use Upwork
#32Long term upwork Data Scientist here. It seems he had a bad experience, that could have happened on any other place / platform. There are always horror stories about how platforms deal with conflicts (think PayPal, Stripe, Uber...) Out of >30 contracts I had, only 1 resulted in a dispute, and it was decided in my favor. I do agree the whole monitoring thing is absurd and I generally don't take jobs from clients that…
> I generally don't take jobs from clients that demand hours to be logged through the monitoring app Isn’t like 9/10 jobs there require you to use the monitoring?
Not at all. Maybe for low paying jobs.
Re: Data scientists shouldn't use Upwork
#33> the dataset contained ... demographic attributes like race ... to predict actual work performance Regardless of the original intent, that's a request to launder a protected class into an opaque "work performance" metric. Also, while they are not on the unfortunately short list of protected classes, using demographics like age is probably going to create similar discrimination problems. If you want to know about job…
Excellent point!
Isn't age a protected class though? At least in the US, discrimination over 40 is covered by the EEOC.
Re: Data scientists shouldn't use Upwork
#34I've been using UpWork for over a year now and never had a dispute so far. The author is right in saying that UpWork only guarantees payment when time tracking using their app. Where he is mistaken though is where he says that the app requires camera to be on at all times. There is such an option but personally I'd never go for a project like this. And yes, the app will take the screenshot of the stuff you are workin…
Yeah, I've been working on Upwork for about 1.5 years now and it has been such a vast improvement over other freelancing sites - both in terms of the size and scope of the projects and in terms of the types of clients available. Not one of my hourly clients has ever insisted that I use the monitoring app; yet I do it anyway because then I don't underbill and the payments are guaranteed.
In my mind, the screenshot every 10 minutes is no more invasive than sitting next to a colleague in an office and if you want to do something private, simply pause the timer and do it on your own time. Upwork is a pretty great site if you're a freelancer.
Re: Data scientists shouldn't use Upwork
#35Upwork rules require you to have their desktop app installed and let yourself be filmed for the duration of the task? Holy s
UpWork doesn't do filming using your camera, only takes a picture every ~10 minutes. Also the picture taking is optional and can be disabled by client (Throughout 1 year working on UpWork I never had a project which required of me the camera bit). The screenshot taking is required for payment protection.
Re: Data scientists shouldn't use Upwork
#36[deleted]
Re: Data scientists shouldn't use Upwork
#37I'm surprised that the complaint is about getting paid, rather than pointing out that Upwork facilitated an illegal and immoral system to be built. You don't get to use "demographic information" like "race" or "age" or probably many of the columns the post mentions to make hiring decisions. For the sake of the jobs industry, the author should change their post to say this.
Re: Data scientists shouldn't use Upwork
#38> the dataset contained ... demographic attributes like race ... to predict actual work performance Regardless of the original intent, that's a request to launder a protected class into an opaque "work performance" metric. Also, while they are not on the unfortunately short list of protected classes, using demographics like age is probably going to create similar discrimination problems. If you want to know about job…
I actually thought that line was a joke when I first read it. "We don't hire non-citizens, Hispanic people, or anyone over 30" sounds a lot worse than "we evaluate candidates according to an algorithm trained to predict work performance."
Re: Data scientists shouldn't use Upwork
#39> the dataset contained ... demographic attributes like race ... to predict actual work performance Regardless of the original intent, that's a request to launder a protected class into an opaque "work performance" metric. Also, while they are not on the unfortunately short list of protected classes, using demographics like age is probably going to create similar discrimination problems. If you want to know about job…
Excellent point! Isn't age a protected class though? At least in the US, discrimination over 40 is covered by the EEOC.
I'm hazy on the details, but it's not a protected class in the same way that e.g. race is. In alleging racial discrimination (in certain legal venues), statistical evidence of racial discrimination is admissible, however statistical evidence of age discrimination is not. E.g. if there are layoffs, and every grey head disappears, that's not grounds to allege discrimination. You'd have to have someone on record saying "we're firing all of the old fucks because they remind me of the inescapability of my own mortality" to litigate.
Someone with a better grasp on the particulars here please chime in :)
Re: Data scientists shouldn't use Upwork
#40Upwork rules require you to have their desktop app installed and let yourself be filmed for the duration of the task? Holy s
UpWork doesn't do filming using your camera, only takes a picture every ~10 minutes. Also the picture taking is optional and can be disabled by client (Throughout 1 year working on UpWork I never had a project which required of me the camera bit). The screenshot taking is required for payment protection.
> UpWork doesn't do filming using your camera, only takes a picture every ~10 minutes.
And how can I, the person being filmed, verify that?