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The Underworld of Online Content Moderation

The New Yorker interview – The Underworld of Online Content Moderation:  “More than a hundred thousand people work as online content moderators, viewing and evaluating the most violent, disturbing, and exploitative content on social media. In a new book, “Behind the Screen,” Sarah T. Roberts, a professor of information studies at U.C.L.A., describes how this work shapes their professional and personal lives. Roberts, who conducted interviews with current and former content moderators, found that many work in Silicon Valley, but she also travelled as far as the Philippines, where some of the work has been outsourced. From her research, we learn about the emotional toll, low wages, and poor working conditions of most content moderation. Roberts never disputes that the work is crucial, but raises the question of how highly companies like Facebook and Google actually value it..”

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