Silicon Valley has sold us the illusion that artificial intelligence is a frictionless technology that will bring wealth and prosperity to humanity. But hidden beneath this smooth surface lies the grim reality of a precarious global workforce of millions labouring under often appalling conditions to make AI possible. This book presents an urgent, riveting investigation of the intricate network that maintains this exploitative system, revealing the untold truth of AI.
Based on hundreds of interviews and thousands of hours of fieldwork over more than a decade, Feeding the Machine tells the story of a global technology through the eyes of the people who produce it. The book describes the lives of the workers deliberately concealed from view, and the power structures that determine their future. It gives voice to the people whom AI exploits, from accomplished writers and artists to the armies of data annotators, content moderators and warehouse workers, revealing how their dangerous, low-paid labour is connected to longer histories of gendered, racialized, and colonial exploitation.
Order your copy of ‘Feeding the Machine’: The Hidden Human Labour Powering AI, today!
Senior Lecturer, Department of Politics, University of Exeter
James Muldoon ia Reader (Associate Professor) in Management at the Essex Business School, a Research Associate at the Oxford Internet Institute and Head of Digital Research at the Autonomy think tank.
Professor of Internet Geography
Mark Graham is an economic geographer. His research focuses on digital labour, the gig economy, and digital inequalities. He is the author, most recently, of The Gig Economy: A Critical Introduction.
Former Postdoctoral Researcher
Callum Cant is a postdoctoral researcher on the Global Partnership for AI’s 'Fair Work for AI' project focusing on regulatory frameworks for AI in the workplace. His research interests include algorithmic management and class composition.
