What does it say that there's no commentary here? Collective guilt over the human cost of maintaining these services? I also wonder how a site like Ello would deal with this, if they became big enough to need this kind of content moderation.
I can't imagine having to look at the worst humanity has to offer for eight hours a day. It should merit hazard pay and unlimited psychological counseling at the very least.
Do we feel collective guilt over having paramedics who need to scrape dead toddlers run over by trucks off the road, or hospice nurses who spent their days changing the diapers of dementia patients? It's a shit job, but they're stopping everybody else from seeing the worst of humanity.
In Europe (and I am pretty sure in the US as well) paramedics and hospice nurses have access to psychological help and support if something on the job demands it.
> I can't imagine having to look at the worst humanity has to offer for eight hours a day. It should merit hazard pay and unlimited psychological counseling at the very least.
I doubt it's that bad. I think those people are in autopilot mode and just click "reject" all day long based on a few keywords and pattern.
I found amusing when people in news forum think they are censored for they supposedly controversial thoughts. What actually happened is that some poor worker that couldn't care less rejected their post in a glimpse.
I spent my morning bus-ride wondering about this and my conclusion is that there's not much to say ... I wouldn't want that job and I doubt that anyone else would either. The question of why we feel guilt and/or whether we should is a bit ambiguous:
1) If I'm viewing moderated content, how do I even know that? And should I feel guilty for only being shown that which meets certain guidelines? I'd say no. If I'm disturbed by something I see on the Internet, should I assume it's unmoderated content and/or somebody didn't do their job? I don't.
2) If I'm running a business and feel the need to provide moderators, should I feel guilty that they're exposed to the content that's deemed unfit? Assuming I'm paying them what a wage that's mutually acceptable, I don't think so. If the wage wasn't acceptable given the job, people would simply work elsewhere. If I'm seeing high turn-over, that might indicate these employees decide the job isn't worth the psychological trauma only after they've spent time working. Should I help these workers maintain their sanity (through training, counselling, etc as well as designing the systems to minimize the content's impact)? Absolutely! Should I pay them more than the market rate? That doesn't really fix any mental issues the job is causing, it just locks employees into a role they can't take longer.
3) If I'm posting content that needs to be moderated, should I feel guilty that someone has to moderate the garbage I'm spewing? Nope ... I'm the five percent or so of the population that rarely considers the consequence of my on-line actions! In fact, I find it funny to cause other humans discomfort (excuse me while I go DOX the latest underage rape victim).
So the problem is that those who are guilty will never be stopped, and can't easily be blamed. Those in the middle have decided to apply quality standards (which might mean moderation) and are probably clinging to razor-thin profits (if they're not just burning VC money) and it's simply a business decision - do I make more with moderation or without. And those of us viewing any given web page don't know whether or not moderation has happened.
I think it's a lousy answer but my opinion is that there are a lot of jobs in this category - jobs that people don't really want to do. Does anyone really want to be a garbage-man? If you watch "Dirty Jobs" with Mike Rowe, I think you find quite a few that aren't desirable but are made viable by the market.
I can't imagine having to look at the worst humanity has to offer for eight hours a day. It should merit hazard pay and unlimited psychological counseling at the very least.