That's probably true - I wonder whether it would be because of the affront of having to do such menial tasks or the horror of realising that operating a global social network requires somebody to trawl through the filth and risk their mental health?
No, its more like the devs have the necessary marketplace leverage and fallback to either put a quash on that notion or move on to another less ridiculous job. Don't think for a minute devs wouldn't be treated the same (and in some places ARE) if the corporate c-levels could get away with it without bleeding talent that is expensive to re-acquire. I am not, by any means, a Workers of the World Unite kinda person, but group negotiation and gasp unionization is becoming more and more necessary - if ONLY to get the beancounters to consider labor in their souless cost calculations when making decisions that lead to the conditions in the article.
Historically, unions are a tried and true way for improving working conditions and average compensation. Of course, that's also the reason why they are so vehemently opposed...
Very true, but in honesty, they can be almost or more trouble than they solve when they grow so big and bureaucratic as to no longer represent or even actively harm the workers they purport to support - it's these cases a lot of union detractors latch onto in their arguments against unionization, with some degree of fairness. I speak as the son, grandson, and great-grandson of people who were VERY active in their respective unions. In particular my great-grandfather helped to unionize electrical workers in refineries in Texas, and my father was a union steward. They are full of stories of the headaches the union bureaucracy caused.
That being said - those cases are really rare and in terms of harm, the naked calculating exploitation that corporations flirt with is WAY worse imo than the harm a too-big-for-its-britches union causes.
It is because it is a waste of their time and a bad approach and everyone knows it fundamentally on some level - however nice the eglatarian ideal would be in other ways.
It would be like expecting doctors to clean bedpans. Now it is a neccessary task and those who do so should receive appropriate respect even if it is just "Thanks glad I don't have to do it." but anyone off the street and willing to do the dirty job could do it without a doctor's training which they spent over half a decade on to be /entry level/.
Plus incredibly inefficient for effectively paying say $100/hr to a janitor when they could be saving lives instead.
Now asking them to do it in a neccessary and justifiable situation (say posting in an aid camp cut off by weather or in space thus making sending any extra bodies expensive) is one thing and they would be in the wrong then for refusing out of pride.
Absent that neccessity it shows poor sense of their actual value until medical degrees and skills become just as common as the skills to clean bedpans.
Yes, I should perhaps clarify - I mentioned developers to point out that Facebook has the resources to provide excellent working conditions.
If I can adapt (and perhaps torture) your analogy, I'd say it's like Facebook currently has doctors who save lives and command high salaries, and janitors who change bedpans but don't have access to hot water and latex gloves. So inevitably, the janitors catch a disease (hospitals are filthy, after all! This is foreseeable!) and are no longer able to work, at which point they are replaced.
Given that the hospital can afford to pay the doctors, we might ask if they could splash out for latex gloves and soap for the janitors, too.
The different is there are plenty of people who are not affected negatively with those "horrible" content. Me for example, if not for the low salary I would do it.
Your example seems useless. There would be minimum working condition requirement enforced by labor department. So it would be illegal that janitors be forced to work in filthy conditions without necessary gears. Similarly FB would be fulfilling the working conditions set by labor department for desk workers.
People are essentially asking if FB can increase salary/ perks by x amount because internet commenters are somehow not feeling good about current scenario.
> There would be minimum working condition requirement enforced by labor department.
Yeah, this is basically what I'm saying. :) Labour codes are developed over time. In the beginning, it's the wild west. Want to be a janitor and not use any personal protective equipment? Go right ahead! After workers keep getting sick, the government begins to legislate requirements around health and safety.
Awareness of mental illness is a relatively new thing. We'll probably see some developments in this area if the big tech companies continue to outsource moderation at scale. https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/may/25/facebook-modera... is a nice article that describes accommodations that other companies provide to moderators. They include, as an example, monthly psychologist visits which continue after the person stops working for the organization. They also include training for the person's family and social support groups.
Executives would also not put up with it - obviously, to the point that I'm not sure whether you meant to include them or not when you said "employees".
Not wanting drudge work is common to nearly all people who have options. Why should devs get all the hate?
Probably not the ones—if any—that lurk 4chan and other extreme imageboards, having been desensitized to such content or probably even get something off of it.
I actually wonder now how much of their workforce would fit in that demographic.
I was just thinking that. 4chan janitors are volunteers. Of course, the payoff is helping 4chan exist, not helping Facebook make a few billion more, so the incentive is still vastly different. Still, that might be the right recruitment pool.
