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Cloudwork
Remote work has become rapidly normalised as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. This trend has been aided and accompanied by explosive growth in the online gig economy. With this growth has come new opportunities for workers from all over the world to participate in a planetary-scale labour market.
The Fairwork Cloudwork Ratings 2023 assesses and scores basic standards of fairness in working arrangements on 15 web-based digital labour platforms according to the five Fairwork principles: fair pay, conditions, contracts, management, and representation.
The ratings show that most cloudwork platforms are not meeting minimum standards of fair pay, fair conditions, fair contracts, fair management, and fair representation. However, some platforms have chosen to incorporate standards of fairness into their design and operations—including as a result of engagement with Fairwork researchers. This shows that platforms can choose to address harms and injustices in the global online work economy.
Related press coverage
Behind the AI boom, an army of overseas workers in ‘digital sweatshops’
The Washington Post, 28 August 2023
While AI is often thought of as human-free machine learning, the technology actually relies on the labor-intensive efforts of a workforce spread across much of the Global South and often subject to exploitation.
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Folha de Sao Paulo, 19 July 2023
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Estudo aponta precarização no trabalho de “frilas” em plataformas
Agencia Brasil, 20 July 2023
Especialistas alertam sobre isolamento e desestímulo ao profissional. Esta é a conclusão de uma pesquisa conduzida pelo Projeto Fairwork, desenvolvido por equipes da instituição britânica Oxford Internet Institute e do instituto alemão WZB.
The human costs of the AI boom
Tech Crunch, 21 August 2023
AI companies are using online labor to outsource the large amounts of hidden manual work needed to build their applications.
