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I was working for a scientific journal. In the peer-review department, they had to use this proprietary software, and we had 2 employees who just mindlessly wen
by WhompingWindows 7y ago
I was working for a scientific journal. In the peer-review department, they had to use this proprietary software, and we had 2 employees who just mindlessly went through this proprietary software's form day-in, day-out. This form spammed scientists for reviews of science articles for our somewhat-predatory journal (we solicited authors to publish in our journal for a fee)...
First, it was a massive waste of those 2 human's intellect, entering data over and over into a generic form from a proprietary business' website, in order to spam scientists. I started a ruby project to automate out all those processes, just using selenium to enter the data onto the web form for us. Before I could get very far, I got a huge promotion elsewhere and left that under-compensating journal.
It all gave me a depressing vibe though, both the ethics of what we were doing and the waste of time/life that those employees had to endure to do it.
- dev_dull 7y ago> First, it was a massive waste of those 2 human's intellect This is usually the reality and it's nothing to be ashamed about. At work, do what you're paid to do. In your free time, pursue interests (literally, things that are interesting to you).
- NotSammyHagar 7y agoWhen those jobs are automated, what will the human workers do, will they leave that company? I'd enjoy doing something else if that was my job, but if there was a more useful job there, wouldn't they already be doing it? This is in summary why I think more automation will lead to some people losing their jobs - if there was a more profitable alternative for a company (more productive, paid as well or better?) then wouldn't the company already have automated it?