Lascau, Laura;
Gould, Sandy JJ;
Brumby, Duncan P;
Cox, Anna L;
(2022)
Crowdworkers' temporal flexibility is being traded for the convenience of requesters through 19 'invisible mechanisms' employed by crowdworking platforms.
In:
CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems Extended Abstracts (CHI ’22 Extended Abstracts).
ACM: Association for Computing Machinery: New Orleans, LA, USA.
(In press).
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Abstract
Crowdworking platforms are a prime example of a product that sells flexibility to its consumers. In this paper, we argue that crowdworking platforms sell temporal flexibility to requesters to the detriment of workers. We begin by identifying a list of 19 features employed by crowdworking platforms that facilitate the trade of temporal flexibility from crowdworkers to requesters. Using the list of features, we conduct a comparative analysis of nine crowdworking platforms available to U.S.-based workers, in which we describe key differences and similarities between the platforms. We find that crowdworking platforms strongly favour features that promote requesters’ temporal flexibility over workers’ by limiting the predictability of workers’ working hours and restricting paid time. Further, we identify which platforms employ the highest number of features that facilitate the trade of temporal flexibility from workers to requesters, consequently increasing workers’ temporal precarity. We conclude the paper by discussing the implications of the results.
| Type: | Proceedings paper |
|---|---|
| Title: | Crowdworkers' temporal flexibility is being traded for the convenience of requesters through 19 'invisible mechanisms' employed by crowdworking platforms |
| Event: | ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1145/3491101.3519629 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1145/3491101.3519629 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | © 2022 Copyright held by the owner/author(s). Publication rights licensed to ACM. This is the author’s version of the work. It is posted here for your personal use. Not for redistribution. The definitive Version of Record was published in CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems Extended Abstracts (CHI ’22 Extended Abstracts), April 29-May 5, 2022, New Orleans, LA, USA, https://doi.org/10.1145/3491101.3519629. |
| Keywords: | platform economy, crowdwork, microwork, temporal flexibility, temporal precarity |
| UCL classification: | UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Engineering Science UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Engineering Science > Dept of Computer Science UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10147585 |
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