As COVID-19 hastens the adoption of remote work tools, it deepens the divide between those who can and can't work remotely, and normalizes social distancing
Will Oremus / OneZero :
OneZeroWill Oremus
Context & Ripple Effects
Written days into the March 2020 lockdowns, this piece frames two forces moving at once: collaboration software going from perk to necessity almost overnight, and a workforce splitting along a single line — whose job can travel over a wire and whose cannot. The same week's coverage showed both edges of that split: gig workers left with no pay protection if they self-quarantined while their tech-employer clients sent staff home, and [[a:951378|ICANN running its four-day Public Meeting for ~3,000 people from 150 countries entirely remotely]] for the first time.
First-order effects
Tech employers' sudden shift to remote work makes video conferencing and collaboration tools mission-critical infrastructure overnight, while the gig workers serving those same offices absorb income loss with no equivalent support.
Second-order effects
Demand migrates down the stack: by mid-2020 the spending shows up as [[a:956128|investment in desktop-as-a-service, purpose-built remote-communication hardware, and home-office equipment]], turning the home desk into a provisioned corporate endpoint.
Third-order effects
The remote/in-person divide hardens into a durable labor-market structure — and the pendulum's limits show later when Zoom itself asks nearby employees back two days a week, confirming hybrid rather than fully remote as the settled end state.
The trend: The pandemic compressed years of digital transformation into months, permanently sorting work into remote-capable and location-bound tiers with different safety nets.
It will be truly heart breaking move if nursing homes are forced to ban visitors. So many people get just one visit a week, some a lot less, but it's what they look forward to all week. Some don't want to socialise with other residents just count hours until their families visit.…
“Once employers and employees realize that they can function largely as normal without gathering in an office every day, odds are that both will want to try more of that.” https://onezero.medium.com/...
This is one of the most heartbreaking stories I've reported. One main conclusion: Just as those of us least affected by coronavirus need to take precautions to limit its spread, we also need to reach out to limit its social damage. https://www.vox.com/...
I profoundly disagree that working from home means our future *has* to be isolating. We are so haplessly tied to consumerism that we forget we could (and once did) leave home and socialize for reasons aside work and buying stuff. https://twitter.com/...
Social distancing is crucial to slow the coronavirus. But it's going to cause a “social recession”: a collapse in social contact that will hit the elderly and people with disabilities particularly hard. Loneliness can be lethal. We need to help them. https://www.vox.com/...
Important article from the @guardian about telework, healthcare, and contractors' lack of access. This is further proof that we need paid sick leave for all. https://www.theguardian.com/ ...
It's amazing how many of these articles and studies utterly reject the notion that not all people work in an office block. Retail? Manufacturing? Healthcare? Agriculture? Engineering? Defence? Yep, go isolate yourself behind a Zoom screen, Silicon Valley has got this. https://twi…
I have to disagree that disabled and elderly people are going to be most impacted by the loneliness imposed by #SocialDistancing. Why? Because we're already incredibly isolated and lonely. https://twitter.com/...
Now, with coronavirus threatening gathering spaces around the country, telecommuting is about to go mainstream. It's conceivable that this will be just a blip, and everything will return to normal once the threat has passed. But that seems unlikely. http://read.medium.com/sanv5z3
This is our economy's inequality in a nutshell: “Our second-class status now has literal health implications, one of the contractors told me.” https://twitter.com/...
Google's offices in Pittsburgh were a ghost town yesterday - except for several dozen subcontracted workers who Google won't allow to work remotely. “Our second-class status now has literal health implications,” one of the contractors told me. https://twitter.com/...
“The office is so empty. Even more so than when the Googlers have their ski trip.” The Google office in Pittsburgh is a ghost town - except for subcontractors. “Maybe this shows how much they really need us. Or maybe it just shows how little they care.” https://www.theguardian.co…