{"title":"Solidarity and collective issues in remote crowd work: A mixed methods study of the Amazon Mechanical Turk online forum","authors":"Markus Hertwig, Manuel Holz, Philipp Lorig","doi":"10.1111/ntwe.12285","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"The article deals with collective issues and emerging forms of solidarity in remote crowd work. Using the example of the Amazon Mechanical Turk platform, we analyse communication in one of the oldest online labour forums (OLF) with a mixed-methods-approach (web scraping, topic modelling and qualitative content analysis) over a 10-year period. We identify six broader themes of collective relevance whose importance varies over time. The results indicate that elements of solidarity emerge as crowd workers communicate about deprivations, develop collective orientations, and invoke injustice frames. However, there are no indications of more profound collective activities, which may be due to different types of crowd workers, some of whom have conflicting orientations. We develop assumptions about restrictions of OLF in facilitating collective action and tasks for organisers. The research contributes to a better understanding of mobilisation issues in remote platform labour.","PeriodicalId":51550,"journal":{"name":"New Technology Work and Employment","volume":"13 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.5000,"publicationDate":"2023-12-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"New Technology Work and Employment","FirstCategoryId":"91","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1111/ntwe.12285","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ERGONOMICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The article deals with collective issues and emerging forms of solidarity in remote crowd work. Using the example of the Amazon Mechanical Turk platform, we analyse communication in one of the oldest online labour forums (OLF) with a mixed-methods-approach (web scraping, topic modelling and qualitative content analysis) over a 10-year period. We identify six broader themes of collective relevance whose importance varies over time. The results indicate that elements of solidarity emerge as crowd workers communicate about deprivations, develop collective orientations, and invoke injustice frames. However, there are no indications of more profound collective activities, which may be due to different types of crowd workers, some of whom have conflicting orientations. We develop assumptions about restrictions of OLF in facilitating collective action and tasks for organisers. The research contributes to a better understanding of mobilisation issues in remote platform labour.
期刊介绍:
New Technology, Work and Employment presents analysis of the changing contours of technological and organisational systems and processes in order to encourage an enhanced and critical understanding of the dimensions of technological change in the workplace and in employment more generally. The journal is eclectic and invites contributions from across the social sciences, with the primary focus on critical and non-managerial approaches to the subject. It has the aim of publishing papers from perspectives concerned with the changing nature of new technology and workplace and employment relations. The objective of the journal is to promote deeper understanding through conceptual debate firmly rooted in analysis of current practices and sociotechnical change.