An expert on how data and algorithms are changing work responds to Janelle Shane's "The Skeleton Crew." "The Skeleton Crew" asks us to consider two questions. The first is an interesting twist on an age-old thought experiment. But the second is more complicated, because the story invites us to become aware of a very real phenomenon and to consider what, if anything, should be done about the way the world is working for some people. The first question explores what it would mean if our machines, robots, and now artificial intelligences had feelings the way we do. "The Skeleton Crew" offers an interesting twist because the A.I. indeed has feelings just like us, because it is, in fact, us: The A.I. is a group of remote workers faking the operations of a haunted house to make it seem automated and intelligent.

An expert on how data and algorithms are changing work responds to Janelle Shane's "The Skeleton Crew." "The Skeleton Crew" asks us to consider two questions. The first is an interesting twist on an age-old thought experiment. But the second is more complicated, because the story invites us to become aware of a very real phenomenon and to consider what, if anything, should be done about the way the world is working for some people. The first question explores what it would mean if our machines, robots, and now artificial intelligences had feelings the way we do. "The Skeleton Crew" offers an interesting twist because the A.I. indeed has feelings just like us, because it is, in fact, us: The A.I. is a group of remote workers faking the operations of a haunted house to make it seem automated and intelligent.

The work, or the output, itself is not inherently bad or good. It is specifically the work conditions that make it bad or good. Providing a service like those we describe in the book, captioning a translation or cleaning training data for training algorithms--that work is often written off as mundane drudgery. Think of content moderation right now and how it's sensationalized as something horrific and terrible to do. And it's a job that actually takes quite a bit of creativity and insight and judgment.