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DOMESTIC AND FACTORY WORKERS IN INDIA are earning money just by strapping a camera on their head to record them while doing their daily tasks. While some are just happy getting paid doing mundane daily tasks, other stories show an almost dystopian reality of workers repeating chores, such as folding clothes, in an artificial environment to teach AI robots that will take over their jobs in the future.

Agency France-Presse (AFP) reports that an AI data company Objectways is one such firm conducting these AI-teaching trials in India, particularly Tamil Nadu. Objectways runs its operation in the US and India, with Fortune 500 MNCs listed as their clients. The US-based company uses Amazon SageMaker, a platform for machine learning models, to develop their AI models.

Nagireddy Sriramyachandra, a 25-year-old Chennai woman, was seen filming herself slicing mangoes while attaching a camera equipment on her head. According to AFP, Objectways is paying these workers a little more than $2 an hour for these activities, which they call is an “invaluable” data for global tech companies.

"Who else will give you 250 rupees an hour just for doing housework?", Sriramyachandra said to AFP. She also showed enthusiasm for the AI robot training, knowing full well what she was paid for. “I may get a robot myself in the future,” the young Tamil woman remarked.

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AI developers believe that sending a first person image, also called “ego centric data,” will help robots learn to copy humans better. The workers are reportedly using head mounted cameras, smart glasses, or motion sensors to train the AI models. Workers also report that the device gives them warning when hands are not detected to conduct proper recording.

Nagireddy Sriramyachandra is just one out of thousands of workers who are part of this AI-teaching workforce in India.  While some of them are doing household chores like her, others were reported to be working in the textile factories, and specialised studios.

Objectways President Ravi Shankar listed the videos his company receives as “Folding clothes, coffee making... cooking a very specific thing, sandwich making.”

Shankar also remarked about the future of these jobs, saying, “Some jobs are supposed to be taken over, so humans can go and do better things." The 50-year-old Objectways President is himself born in Tamil Nadu and completed his graduation in Mechanical Engineering from Bharathidasan University in Tiruchirappalli. While he now resides in the United States, Ravi Shankar hires its workers from its home state via subcontractors.

According to the AFP report, India has positioned itself as a “global middleman of creation, processing and annotation of AI data.” Aditi Surie, Digital Labor Expert from Indian Institute of Human Settlements in Bengaluru, said, “It's likely that these data collection services will increase.”

In what can be described as one of the most dystopian of settings is the ordeal of clients at an Objectways studio. Young AI trainers spend their days in fake, fully furnished apartment rooms, filming themselves doing everyday household chores. After thousands of hours of footage, the studio simply changes the wallpaper to create "variety" for its clients.

21-year-old engineering graduate Rani N. was reported to be recording herself folding the same towel on different spots of the bed. She records the same four-minute video 90 times a day. While she says the job is “tolerable,” she also admits it feels uncomfortable constantly wearing a camera. In other rooms, workers are reported to have been arranging pencil sharpeners, water bottles, and crayons while being recorded by depth-sensor cameras.

According to reports, even voice data is being collected. In Bengaluru, Humyn Labs records people discussing politics, entertainment, and other topics to train AI how to copy natural human speech patterns.

In its report presented in the Global AI summit, NITI Aayog commented on the development of artificial intelligence and its relation with labor work. The Government’s policy commission mentions that most of the discussion is focussed “on white-collar professionals and predict an almost certain loss of jobs in the segment" without urgent action. NITI Aayog warned that “Little attention, if any, is paid to how AI can serve India's 490 million informal workers, the very people who form the backbone of our economy."

While speaking with AFP, one data entrepreneur claims humans and robots will “work together.” However, the discussion on the ground is less about development but more about how this “progress” will hamper them as these educated young workers are teaching futuristic machines to perform the very tasks that could make their own roles obsolete.

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