Mastodawn

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

When we talk about the abuses of #GigWork, there's some obvious targets, like #AlgorithmicWageDiscrimination, where two workers are paid different rates for the same job, in order to trick occasional gig-workers to give up their other sources of income and become dependent on the app:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

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If you'd like an essay-formatted version to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/30/computer-says-scab/#instawork

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Pluralistic: Gig apps trap reverse centaurs in wage-stealing Skinner boxes (12 Apr 2023) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

Then there's the opacity - imagine if your boss refused to tell you how much you'll get paid for a job until *after* you've completed it, claimed that this was done in order to "protect privacy" - and then threatened anyone who helped you figure out the true wage on offer:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/07/hr-4193/#boss-app

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Pluralistic: 07 Aug 2021 – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

Opacity is #WageTheft's handmaiden: every gig worker producing content for a social media algorithm is subject to having their reach - and hence their pay - cut based on the unaccountable, inscrutable decisions of a content moderation system:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/10/e2e/#the-censors-pen

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Pluralistic: Freedom of reach IS freedom of speech (10 Dec 2022) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

Making content for an algorithm is like having a boss that docks every paycheck because you broke rules that you are not allowed to know, because if you knew the rules, you'd figure out how to cheat without your boss catching you. Content moderation is the last place where #SecurityThroughObscurity is considered good practice:

https://doctorow.medium.com/como-is-infosec-307f87004563

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Como Is Infosec - Cory Doctorow - Medium

Content moderation is a security problem.. “Como Is Infosec” is published by Cory Doctorow.

Medium

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

When workers #SeizeTheMeansOfComputation, amazing things happen. In #Indonesia, gig workers create and trade #tuyul apps that let them unilaterally modify the way that their bosses' systems see them - everything from GPS spoofing to accessibility mods:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/07/08/tuyul-apps/#gojek

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Pluralistic: 08 Jul 2021 – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

So the tech and #labor story isn't wholly grim: there are lots of ways that tech can enhance labor struggles, letting workers collaborate and coordinate. Without digital systems, we wouldn't have the #HotStrikeSummer:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/02/not-what-it-does/#who-it-does-it-to

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Pluralistic: How tech changed global labor struggles for better and worse (02 Dec 2022) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

As the historic writer/actor strike shows us, the resurgent labor movement and the senescent forces of crapulent capitalism are locked in a death-struggle over not just what digital tools do, but who they do it *for* and who they do it *to*:

https://locusmag.com/2022/01/cory-doctorow-science-fiction-is-a-luddite-literature/

When it comes to the epic fight over who technology acts for and against, we need a diversity of tactics, backstopped by tech operated by and for its users - and by laws that protect workers and the public.

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Cory Doctorow: Science Fiction is a Luddite Literature

From 1811-1816, a secret society styling themselves “the Luddites” smashed textile machinery in the mills of England. Today, we use “Luddite” as a pejorative referring to backwards, anti-technology…

Locus Online

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

That dynamic is in sharp focus in #UniteHereLocal11's strike against #OrangeCounty's #LagunaCliffsMarriottResort.

The #UNITEHERE strike turns on the usual issues like a living wage (hotel staff are paid so little they have to rent rooming-house beds *by the shift*, paying for the right to sleep in a room for a few hours at a time, without any permanent accommodation).

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Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

They're also seeking health-care and pensions, so they can be healthy at work and retire after long service. Finally, they're seeking their employer's support for LA's #ResponsibleHotelsOrdinance, which would levy a tax on hotel rooms to help pay for hotel workers' housing costs (a hotel worker who can't afford a bed is the equivalent of a fast food worker who has to apply for food stamps):

https://www.unitehere11.org/responsible-hotels-ordinance/

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Responsible Hotels Ordinance - UNITE HERE Local 11

The Responsible Hotels Ordinance will help address the affordable housing crisis by: Ensuring hotel developments do not displace affordable housing Establishing a program similar to the successful Project Roomkey to provide temporary lodging for unhoused families and individuals. Read the full text of the Responsible Hotel Ordinance.

UNITE HERE Local 11

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

But the #Marriott - which is owned by the #UofCalifornia and managed by #AimbridgeHospitality - has refused to bargain, walking out negotiations.

But the employer didn't walk out over wages, benefits or support for a housing subsidy. They walked out when workers demanded that the #scabs that the company was trying to hire to break the strike be given full time, union jobs.

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Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

These aren't just any scabs, either. They're predominantly Black workers who rely on the $700m #Instawork app for gigs. These workers are being dispatched to cross the picket line without any warning that they're being contracted as #strikebreakers. When workers refuse the cross the picket and join the strike, Instawork cancels all their shifts and permanently blocks them from new jobs.

This is a new, technologically supercharged form of illegal strikebreaking.

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Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

It's one thing for a single boss to punish a worker who refuses to scab, but Instawork acts as a plausible-deniability filter for *all the major employers in the region*. Like the landlord apps that allow landlords to illegally fix rents by coordinating hikes, Instawork lets bosses illegally collude to rig wages by coordinating a blocklist of workers who refuse to scab:

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/10/company-that-makes-rent-setting-software-for-landlords-sued-for-collusion/

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Company that makes rent-setting software for landlords sued for collusion

RealPage worked with some of the nation’s largest landlords to raise rents, says lawsuit.

Ars Technica

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

The racial dimension is really important here: the Marriott has a longstanding de facto policy of refusing to hire Black workers, and whenever they are confronted with this, they insist that there are no qualified Black workers in the labor pool. But as soon as the predominantly Latino workforce struck, Marriott discovered a vast Black workforce that it could coerce into scabbing, in collusion with Instawork.

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Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

Now, all of this isn't just sleazy, it's *illegal*, a violation of Section 7 of the #NationalLaborRelationsBoard Act. Historically, that wouldn't have mattered, because a string of presidents, R and D, have appointed useless do-nothing ghouls to run the NLRB.

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Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

But the #Biden admin, pushed by the party's left wing, made a string of historic, excellent appointments, including #NLRB General Counsel #JenniferAbruzzo, who has set her sights on punishing gig work companies for flouting labor law:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/01/10/see-you-in-the-funny-papers/#bidens-legacy

UNITE HERE 11 has brought a case to the NLRB, charging the Instawork, the UC system, Marriott, and Aimbridge with violating labor law by blackmailing gig workers into crossing the picket line.

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Pluralistic: 10 Jan 2022 – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

The union is also asking the NLRB to punish the companies for failing to protect workers from violent retaliation from the wealthy hotel guests who have punched them and screamed epithets at them. The hotel has refused to identify these thug guests so that the workers they assaulted can swear out complaints against them.

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Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

Writing about the strike for *Jacobin*, #AlexNPress tells the story of #ThomasBradley, a Black worker who was struck off all Instawork shifts for refusing to cross the picket line and joining it instead:

https://jacobin.com/2023/07/southern-california-hotel-workers-strike-automated-management-unite-here

Bradley's case is exhibit A in the UNITE HERE 11 case before the NLRB. He has a degree in culinary arts, but racial discrimination in the industry has kept him stuck in gig and temp jobs ever since he graduated, nearly a quarter century ago.

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Southern California Hotel Workers Are on Strike Against Automated Management

On top of issues like low pay, workers are up against faceless algorithmic management that can punish them for various offenses — including for refusing to cross picket lines. Workers at a hotel in Southern California are on strike against this practice.

Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

Bradley lived out of his car, but that was repossessed while he slept in a hotel room that UNITE HERE 11 fundraised for him, leaving him homeless and bereft of all his worldly possessions.

With UNITE HERE 11's help, Bradley's secured a job at the downtown LA Westin Bonaventure Hotel & Suites, a hotel that *has* bargained with the workers.

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Cory Doctorow Jul 30, 2023

Bradley is using his newfound secure position to campaign among other Instawork workers to convince them not to cross picket lines. In these group chats, *Jacobin* saw workers worrying "that joining the strike would jeopardize their standing on the app."

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Boolean Boss 🧹 (Ari)Jul 30, 2023

@pluralistic whoa that would be very illegal where I am but people basically had to die to get us here. 😰 This is terrible.

Boolean Boss 🧹 (Ari)Jul 30, 2023

@pluralistic then again it just occurred to me that YouTube does this...