Institute for Human Obsolescence
I first saw Manuel Beltrán brilliantly present the Institute of Human Obsolescence at a Tactical Tech Info-Activism exhibition in London in late 2017.
His big idea was that we should all be paid from any money made off our data.
I suspect it’s called the Institute of Human Obsolescence because, increasingly, humanity, to tech companies, is an irrelevance.
Standards in Public Life
Anyway, it was nice to just scroll into Manuel’s latest tweet:
Sunday research at the intersection between Indian gig economy and toilet infrastructure: Ola exploits data production from their drivers to develop self-driving toilets. #SwacchBharat #DigitalColonialism pic.twitter.com/fANmfjlN1i
— Manuel Beltrán (@Beltrandroid) March 31, 2019
Manuel retweeted this a couple of days ago:
And if this is your idea of an april fool gag, trying to be cool like google, the joke is actually on you. A cruel irony if you will. Your drivers sleep in their cars, pee on the roadside, in bottles. And you want to privatize toilet infrastructure. https://t.co/nFWI6oQxts
— The Soya Factor (@tetisheri) March 31, 2019
Exploitation of EU & non-EU Workers
UK-based EU-focused Data Journalist Crina Boros told me about her recent Sweatshops on Wheels project on EU-based Truckers exploited under the Posted Workers directive.
Check out Sweatshops on wheels, an investigation into the absolute exploitation of Truck Drivers in the EU. https://t.co/Br516z6rSA
— Ranjan Balakumaran (@financialeyes) March 31, 2019
International Transport Workers’ Federation
Jeremy Anderson of the International Transport Workers Federation recently told me about his work to support transport workers globally and some of the boardroom campaigns currently being waged by Trade Union Pension funds to protect standards for workers.
Petty Theft & Shop-Lyfting
Lyft, which just floated in the US, is going to be subject to plenty of boardroom conflict.
So, #gigeconomy disruptors #Lyft and #Juno (who were once progressive I thought) are no lovers of regulation – that’s clear. However, to file a lawsuit to block the new #NYC #minimumwage rule for app drivers is a new low. Is this the #futureofwork we envisioned? Smh. https://t.co/ctsBIbEjSW
— Ruwan Subasinghe (@RuwanSubasinghe) January 30, 2019
Lyft IPO sets the stage for Uber listing later this spring https://t.co/Q5Z0cTmNpA via @financialtimes
— Ranjan Balakumaran (@financialeyes) March 31, 2019
Rise of the Working Class Shareholder
We’ll be looking at David Webber‘s: The Rise of the Working Class Shareholder at the Heretical Finance Reading Group in London tomorrow. It was this book that first alerted me to trade union shareholder activism in boardroom campaigns to protect workers’ interests.
Janet Williamson of the TUC was one of the co-ordinators of the boardroom campaign to get Sports Direct to improve workers conditions:
Sports Direct’s surrender is just the the start, says TUC https://t.co/eVuYlvh0Km
— Ranjan Balakumaran (@financialeyes) March 31, 2019
#MeToo actions have been fought through boardrooms too:
California pension trustees call for disclosures of #MeToo costs https://t.co/UdIl3k44U0 via @markets
— Emily Chasan (@echasan) January 14, 2019
Share Action, formerly Fair Pensions, also do great AGM Activism.
In the last book club we looked at Cathy O’Neill‘s Weapons of Math Destruction.
A brilliant book which concludes with recommendations that we AUDIT ALGORITHMS.
Audit the algorithms that are ruling our lives https://t.co/XIhLRQL5mi via @financialtimes
— Ranjan Balakumaran (@financialeyes) March 31, 2019
Sadly, Cathy is not impressed with Tech’s proposals to Audit AI
“Also on the council is Dyan Gibbens, who heads drone company Trumbull Unmanned“ https://t.co/0urSBvHazB
— Cathy O’Neil (@mathbabedotorg) March 30, 2019
King Zuck is now calling for Regulation of Social Media, whatever that means!
Zuckerberg is in contempt of parliament, @facebook misled the @CommonsCMS about russian interference in brexit, he refused to come to 2 committee meetings to answer questions about it, Zuck’s in no position to ‘ask’ for anything.https://t.co/KYoCCjkDvS
— shady_info/brexit (@shady_inf0) March 30, 2019
Get this. Canada’s privacy authority warned Zuck about data leakage in 2009. If he had honored government, then I bet the #CambridgeAnalytica catastrophe could’ve been avoided. Last month Denham told Zuck to stand-down and let @ICOnews seize and audit SCL’s servers under warrant. https://t.co/FcrnrUw6mI
— David Carroll 🦅 (@profcarroll) April 5, 2018
All Access AI
Before Book Club, at Goldsmiths, there is also a workshop on AI:
‘All Access AI’: Launching a UK-wide network https://t.co/B6vhWQalyx via @goldsmithsuol
— Ranjan Balakumaran (@financialeyes) March 31, 2019
Green New Deal
And in Parliament a New Economics Foundation event on how to finance the Green New Deal:
Here was a recent NEF podcast:
Back to Apps, I just saw a BBC report on Trim It:
• Your feedback led us to refine
• Your support kept us hungry
• Your hair is now our opportunityLONDON, this is the product of our sweat and tears 💪🏾💪🏽💪🏻
Mobile Barbering 🚐+💈=😎
Download our new app and claim your free trim NOW! RT to save a hairline 🙏😅 pic.twitter.com/yhxvMp4IqC
— TRIM-IT (@Trimit_app) March 10, 2019
Not sure why the BBC have to put such a massive emphasis on race.
The conflation of identity politics with environmentalism, culture, philosophy and economics leads to some seriously sloppy thinking in my book.
Though I probably agree on most things with the virtue signalling left, I find their general close mindedness and latent racism more than a little off-putting.
NEF in particular are a nasty bunch, but they do some good work, so I will continue to share some of it.
IEA mix culture, deregulation, the promotion of fossil fuels and are obviously very attractive to white racists.
They have Darren Grimes, who was involved in the most egregious election fraud in recent times, and Matt Ridley, a climate denying Tory Lord on this podcast.
The economics of renewables https://t.co/VTmL8SGbTe
— Ranjan Balakumaran (@financialeyes) March 31, 2019
Time to reshare the Tufton Street video I made with Real Media last year:
Compare with the far more compromised BBC video from a few weeks ago:
Nice to have been ahead of the curve.
Here is Adam Ramsay going a little deeper:
Adam on the reason why Climate Reporting in the media is so terrible:
On Cambridge Analytica and Mercenaries:
Peter Jukes on How Bannon Bought Brexit:
More on Bannon, Putin and Young British Conservative:
It’s great to have been involved in these projects.
Hopefully more interesting stuff to come.
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