Invisible cages : algorithmic evaluations in online labor markets
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Artificial Intelligence systems, powered by algorithms, are seemingly everywhere: in corporations, hospitals, classrooms, cars, and even baby monitors. Despite the prevalence and breathless rhetoric, fewer studies have examined how these systems impact people in practice. This dissertation focuses on understanding the impact of algorithms on people using online labor markets to find work. Existing organizational and social science theory suggests that artificial intelligence and algorithmic systems are "tightening" the iron cage by providing a more sophisticated, rational method of controlling the way people work and interact. This dissertation, however, reveals how an online labor market's use of algorithms is creating modern day invisible cages, in which platforms deliberately hide the norms and expectations for how people should behave. To unpack and theorize this central finding, I draw upon field work collected from one of the world's largest online labor markets. Using participant observation, interviews, and extensive archival data, I first show how people using the online labor market unwittingly gave the platform full permission to implement algorithms that were completely opaque to them. I highlight how the way in which people agree to the terms of service in an online labor market context represents a significant shift compared to previous agreements people consented to in similar, offline labor market settings. I then show how the online labor market implemented an inscrutable algorithm dictating people's success on the platform. The implementation of this algorithm led to what I call "superstitious reactivity, " because people were never able to verify if and how their actions contributed to their success on the online labor market. Taken together, this dissertation has implications for our understanding and the literature on algorithms, evaluations, reactivity, reputation, labor market intermediaries, employment relationships, digital contracts, and agnotology.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic resource; remote; computer; online resource |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Place | California |
| Place | [Stanford, California] |
| Publisher | [Stanford University] |
| Copyright date | 2019; ©2019 |
| Publication date | 2019; 2019 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Author | Rahman, Hatim Ali |
|---|---|
| Degree supervisor | Barley, Stephen R |
| Degree supervisor | Valentine, Melissa (Melissa A.) |
| Thesis advisor | Barley, Stephen R |
| Thesis advisor | Valentine, Melissa (Melissa A.) |
| Thesis advisor | Powell, Walter W |
| Degree committee member | Powell, Walter W |
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of Management Science and Engineering. |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|---|
| Genre | Text |
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Hatim A. Rahman. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of Management Science and Engineering. |
| Thesis | Thesis Ph.D. Stanford University 2019. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2019 by Hatim Ali Rahman
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).
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