A look at Indian nonprofit Karya, which sells AI training data and redirects all the profit to its workers, who retain ownership of the data they create
In the shade of a coconut palm, Chandrika tilts her smartphone screen to avoid the sun's glare. It is early morning in Alahalli village … Mastodon: @OmaymaS@dair-community.social . Bluesky: @mmitchell.bsky.social . Twitter: @peteratmsr , @nixxin , @milagrosmiceli , @random_walker , @asyoulikeit78 , @milagrosmiceli , @billyperrigo , @meenakandasamy , @milagrosmiceli , @milagrosmiceli , @random_walker , and @random_walker . LinkedIn: Deepak Seth Mastodon: @OmaymaS@dair-community.social : Very interesting to hear different voices in tech that are not only US/West Europe centric! — I hope Karya's team keep the balance as they grow in the business world! — https://time.com/... #aiethics #aifairness — [images] Bluesky: Margaret Mitchell / @mmitchell.bsky.social : Really beautiful piece from @billyperrigo.bsky.social concerning some of *the most important* variables in AI right now: Data labeling and compensation. https://time.com/... Twitter: Peter Lee / @peteratmsr : How to make AI data work more fair to people and a more effective path out of poverty? The nonprofit, Karya (a spinout from @MSFTResearch) in India, is gaining early but real traction with its creative, socially-aware, approach. Great coverage by @TIME https://time.com/... Nikhil Pahwa / @nixxin : People have forgotten this: in 2008, @GoogleIndia launched a toll free number, which people could call and get responses to search queries, provided by a human on the other end of the line. Google used it to train voice to text for Indian accents. Shut down in 2010. F @milagrosmiceli : Karya tries to debunk this myth by paying $5/hour (20-30x local minimum wage). This is great in comparison to other BPOs but incredibly cheap for clients who concentrate wealth and power in the AI industry. So the question is: if not Karya, who profits from these workers' labor? Arvind Narayanan / @random_walker : @Sahasrangsu_G There is a detailed explanation in the article. Indian law prevents them from being a nonprofit and doing what they do; so they've set up two companies, one for profit and one nonprofit, which (AFAICT) together function essentially as a nonprofit. @asyoulikeit78 : Sceptical bc of my years of exp with tech innovators, big and small, using rural India as experiment fuel. But hopeful seeing a startup founder in India acknowledge caste / limitations of tech-solutionism for a change! Curious how the data ownership contracts work though. 🧐 @milagrosmiceli : Finally, I want to highlight that AI is always “BY the people.” But before claiming that it is also “FOR the people,” we need to ask who owns the technologies that are fuelled by data workers. The answer probably doesn't include “the people.” Billy Perrigo / @billyperrigo : The workers behind AI rarely reap its rewards. One nonprofit in India is trying to fix that. After years of reporting on the darker side of the AI industry, I traveled to India with one question. Could its alternative model really work? https://time.com/... [image] Dr Meena Kandasamy / @meenakandasamy : This is tech journalism that covers AI from the ground up, when we are so used to thinking about it as policy trickle, or a top-down approach. Great read @milagrosmiceli : This isn't philanthropy. The AI industry needs this labor as much as impoverished communities need jobs. So the question remains: who produces the models that require these workers' expertise and who profits from the “low-skill” narrative? @milagrosmiceli : While companies predate impoverished communities, the fact that they do so to get specific expertise (e.g. language-related) at low prices remains undiscussed. Data workers' unique expertise is vital for AI. Framing their work as low skill serves to justify miserable wages. Arvind Narayanan / @random_walker : The big question is how to put pressure on AI companies to source their data work ethically. What levers do we have? Arvind Narayanan / @random_walker : In India, a shockingly different approach to data work: -nonprofit -pays 20-30x minimum wage -workers retain ownership of data they create (!) -helps build AI for their mother tongue, benefiting locals The challenge, of course, is signing up AI companies. https://time.com/... LinkedIn: Deepak Seth : AI's Transformational Impact at the “Bottom of the Pyramid” — A few weeks ago in a webcast talking about Future of AI (https://www.linkedin.com …