“Online retail giant #Amazon – said to be America’s second-largest employer – is reportedly planning a major expansion of its #warehouse #automation that could reduce the number of #USA #hires by more than 600,000 over the next eight years.

According to internal documents obtained by The #NewYorkTimes, the company’s robotics division aims to automate roughly 75 percent of operations by around 2033, and expects to avoid about 160,000 new roles by 2027.

The #leaked materials also highlight #CostSavings of around $12.6 billion from 2025-2027, or about 30 cents saved per item shipped.”

🤖 #robotics / 🦾 #ZeroHourWork 🦿<https://roboticsandautomationnews.com/2025/10/21/amazon-reportedly-about-to-replace-half-a-million-human-workers-with-robots/95713/>

“The #UK #tech sector is cutting #graduate #jobs dramatically – down 46 percent in the past year, with another 53 percent drop projected, according to figures from the Institute of Student Employers (#ISE).

The culprit? #AI is already doing the entry-level work graduates used to perform like routine #coding, #DataAnalysis, and basic #digital tasks. #Companies still need tech #talent, but they're hiring experienced #workers instead of #training newcomers.”

#ZeroHourWork / #WhiteCollar <https://theregister.com/2025/10/16/uk_tech_grad_jobs/>

“In August Google said it had cut 35% of its managers overseeing teams of fewer than three. In September Fiverr, a freelancing marketplace, said it would shed #managers to focus more on artificial intelligence (#ai). Amazon has been trimming all year in its effort to improve efficiency—most recently in July, at its cloud-computing arm. Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg has been complaining about “managers managing managers” since 2023.

And that’s just in #tech. So far this year phrases relating to “reducing #management layers” have been mentioned 98 times on the earning calls of companies in s&p’s global stockmarket index, twice as often as in the whole of 2022.”

#WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork <https://archive.md/VfX7I> / <https://www.economist.com/business/2025/10/05/bonfire-of-the-middle-managers> (paywall)

“Without a human in the loop.

These #agents are remarkable at what they’re doing, and you can take action with an #agent built on the #Sierra platform — 100 percent of our customers are doing it. To some degree, there’s this technique in #AI called retrieval augmented generation, which is a fancy way of saying it’s answering questions. It turns out that that’s kind of a #commodity at this point.

Slapping #ChatGPT together with a #KnowledgeBase is not that hard. Most #engineers nowadays could do that in a weekend, which by the way is mind-blowing. It was science fiction three years ago; now it’s a weekend project. Welcome to #technology. It’s mind-blowing.” — Bret Taylor

#RAG / #ZeroHourWork / #MIT / #AIBubble / #OpenAi / #Meta / #discussion <https://www.theverge.com/decoder-podcast-with-nilay-patel/773904/sierra-ceo-bret-taylor-ai-agents-openai-bubble-interview>

“Fiverr has told around 250 #staffers that they are back on the market as it pivots to having "a modern, clean, #AI-focused #infrastructure from the ground up."

The company confirmed on Tuesday to #TheRegister that it would #LayOff around 30 percent of its #workforce. In an extended essay on X, #founder and #CEO #MichaKaufman said that AI was going to mean a fundamental #rethink and that the 15-year-old freelance services bazaar is "going back to #startup mode."”

#WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork / #sackings / #restructuring <https://www.theregister.com/2025/09/16/fiverr_ai_layoff/>

“More than half of #tech companies are considering a complete restructure or changing their operating model in response to #AI, according to research from the consulting sector.

Looking at responses from consulting clients, research firm Source said that it found the changes had become a priority among the #technology, #media, and #telecoms sector (#TMT).

Using the research firm's database and interviews with 150 clients, Source found that 60 percent of those in the tech sector expect to invest in organizational restructuring in the next 18 months.

"TMT clients remain unconfident, but advances in AI and new technologies are triggering urgent discussions about business restructuring,"”

#WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork / #layoff / #sacking / #restructure <https://www.theregister.com/2025/09/15/tech_restructures_ai/> / REPORT <https://www.sourceglobalresearch.com/reports/9586-the-technology-media-and-telecoms-consulting-market-in-2025>

“"After a thorough review of our #Human Data efforts, we've decided to accelerate the expansion and prioritization of our specialist #AITutors, while scaling back our focus on general AI tutor roles. This #StrategicPivot will take effect immediately," the email read. "As part of this shift in focus, we no longer need most generalist AI tutor positions and your #employment with xAI will conclude."

#Workers were told that they would be #paid through either the end of their #contract or November 30, but their access to company systems would be terminated the day of the layoff notice.

The #DataAnnotation team is #xAI's largest team. The workers play a key role in developing #Grok by teaching the #chatbot how to #understand the world by #contextualizing and #categorizing raw #data.”

LLMs and chatbot products are a pipeline of human and machine processes. Data annotators put the human into AI products.

#AI / #DataAnnotators / #ZeroHourWork / #WhiteCollar <https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-xai-layoffs-data-annotators-2025-9> (paywall) / <https://archive.md/q56om>

“It was a job Tekkılıç had fallen into and come to love. Late last year, when depression and insomnia had stalled his art career, his older sister sent him a job posting she thought would be a perfect fit for the #tech enthusiast and would help him pay for his rent and iced Americano obsession. On his best weeks, he earned about $1,500, which went a long way in Turkey. The remote work was flexible. And it let him play a small but vital role in the burgeoning world of generative AI.

Hundreds of millions of humans now use #GenerativeAI on a daily basis. Some are treating the bots they commune with as coworkers, therapists, friends, and even lovers. In large part, that's because behind every shiny new #AIModel is an army of humans like Tekkılıç who are paid to train it to sound more human-like. #DataLabelers, as they're known, spend hours reading a #chatbots answers to test #prompts and flag which ones are helpful, accurate, concise, and natural-sounding and which are wrong, rambling, robotic, or offensive”

Humans who filter, AI question/response data. Think about that if you hear marketing about the sophistication of chatbots, AI models and intelligence.

#ZeroHourWork / #WhiteCollar <https://www.businessinsider.com/ai-training-jobs-data-annotators-labelers-outlier-scale-meta-xai-2025-9> (paywall) / <https://archive.md/ejcbc>

“While ANZ has begun sweeping #restructures and started #culling 3500 jobs, some ANZ staffers have taken to online platform Reddit to vent and #gossip. It is an online phenomenon that has given the media – and the wider public – new insights into how Matos’ agenda is being received in parts of ANZ’s workforce.

Some #ANZStaff have taken to #Reddit in response to changes from new chief executive #NunoMatos.

The #SocialMedia platform has meant disgruntled #workers can #anonymously rail against their bosses, crack jokes, share gossip about what’s happening in their section of the bank, and support each other through a time of high anxiety.”

In #Tech, before social media and Reddit, there was FC!

#ElNuno / #Finance / #ZeroHourWork / #WhiteCollar <https://www.theage.com.au/business/banking-and-finance/inside-the-reddit-thread-where-disgruntled-anz-staffers-are-railing-against-the-boss-20250910-p5mtuw.html> / <https://archive.md/wL6GO> / <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fucked_Company> #DotComDeadPool / #FC <https://archive.md/wTkQw>

“Two months ago, the #CommonwealthBank announced plans to replace 45 #CustomerService workers with an #ArtificialIntelligence #chatbot before later backtracking and reversing the decision.

But across the #FinancialServices and #Banking sector, the use of #AI is soaring and thousands of #jobs have been cut – though the connection is rarely officially made.”

#WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork / #CBA / #Australia <https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/sep/09/dhanushi-lost-her-job-the-same-day-cba-rolled-out-an-ai-chatbot-it-may-just-be-the-beginning>

“What’s actually going to happen is #RichPeople are going to use AI to replace #workers,” he says. “It’s going to create massive #unemployment and a huge rise in #profits. It will make a few people much richer and most people poorer. That’s not AI’s fault, that is the #CapitalistSystem.”

#AI / #ZeroHourWork / #WhiteCollar / #capitalism / #GeoffreyHinton <https://www.ft.com/content/31feb335-4945-475e-baaa-3b880d9cf8ce> (paywall) / <https://archive.md/Ua8gt>

“Several #CEOs of major #tech companies in the US have warned that AI will wipe out millions of white-collar and #EntryLevel #TechJobs by as early as 2030. Are we right to fear for the next generation of young people? I am a tech pessimist.

Not only will #AI make many relatively well-paying #MiddleClass #jobs redundant, but its rampant use during critical learning and developmental stages of life threatens to leave young people dependent on it as a tool for basic #research, #writing and #analysis, and ill-equipped to face the challenges of a changing and unstable world.

This is only amplified by the infiltration of #SocialMedia and #TechCompanies into every corner of #social and #cultural life, and with it the addiction-driven commodification of our #time and #attention, packaged into #data insights and #marketing opportunities for sale to #ThirdParties.”

#WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork <https://www.smh.com.au/national/the-first-generation-with-declining-standards-of-living-australia-s-faltering-economic-standing-20250618-p5m8k7.html> (paywall) / <https://archive.md/BkUQw>

@jasongorman @yacc143 The replacement of Engineering: <https://ioc.exchange/@peterrenshaw/114936102022731315>

Thats only one report, follow through #ZeroHourWork or #WhiteCollar to see the news reports I’ve collected.

“From hospitals to #GP clinics, the #tool has been lauded by burnt-out doctors for helping to lighten to back-breaking load.

Dr #BenCondon, who now works for an Australian #HealthTechnology company, first stumbled across #AI during a shift in a rural #WesternAustralian emergency department.

"I was blown away by how much it helped, in terms of giving me an extra set of hands … *writing all my notes*," he said.

But experts have warned there are real #risks: patient #information from #DataBreaches can fetch a pretty penny on the dark web, and the #technology has the potential to generate "#misleading" #information”

#WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork / #HealthSystems / #Australia <https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-07-07/ai-scribes-gps-and-hospitals-accuracy-data-breach-risk/105490478>

“Jamie Dimon is unequivocal about the impact of #RemoteWorking on #training new bankers. “It doesn’t work in our business,” the chief executive of JPMorgan Chase told Stanford’s Graduate School of Business this year.

“Younger people [are] left behind.”
He has previously spoken of the importance of “the #apprenticeship model . . . which is almost impossible to replicate in the #Zoom world”.

In many #workplaces, that #ApprenticeshipModel is as simple as sitting near a more experienced #colleague or joining a #client meeting to watch how it is done, while also *learning the ropes* by taking on often more #repetitive and #basic #tasks.

But #OnTheJob learning is now facing the double threat of #HybridWorking, which means #JuniorStaff spend less time #observing and #listening to more senior #colleagues, and #GenerativeAI, which is making #obsolete many of the routine tasks that have long been building blocks of #ProfessionalKnowledge.”

#WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork / #AI <https://www.ft.com/content/071089b8-839a-4f96-af79-394c08a146d1> (paywall) / <https://archive.md/WROMn>

“When implementing an AI strategy, #companies have to look at all these aspects to find the best fit for their needs. This is harder than it sounds. A business’s decision on how to #deploy AI is very different to choosing a static #technology stack to be rolled out across an entire organisation in an identical way.

Businesses have yet to understand that a successful #AIStrategy is “no longer a #tech decision made in a tech department about #hardware”, says #MackenzieHowe, co-founder of #Atheni, an AI strategy #consultant. As a result, she says, nearly *three-quarters of #AI rollouts do not give any return on investment*.”

#WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork / #infrastructure / #AIDeployment <https://www.ft.com/content/8452bf94-9a41-4040-913f-ef1a462d6ea6> (paywall) / <https://archive.md/WlhLh>

“The natural worry for anyone hoping to have a job in five years’ time is what #AI might do to that job. And while there are few certainties, Autor and Thompson’s framework does suggest a clarifying question: does AI look like it is going to do the most highly skilled part of your #job or the low-skill rump that you’ve not been able to get rid of?

The answer to that question may help to #predict whether your job is about to get more fun or more annoying — and whether your #salary is likely to rise, or fall as your #ExpertWork is #devalued like the expert work of the #Luddites.”

#WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork / #ArtificialIntelligence / #economics / #MartinWolf <https://www.ft.com/content/b67bcbaa-67b9-48f8-ad4d-4cd6f9bdc1b7> (paywall) / <https://archive.md/Cn6lu>

“‘They can help deliver a lot more notes #faster with #LessWork, but ultimately the decision on what’s helpful enough to show still comes down to #humans,’ Coleman said Tuesday in an interview. “So we think that combination is incredibly #powerful.”

There are currently hundreds of notes published to Twitter (x) every day, Coleman said, and while he doesn’t have a target for how that might change once AI is involved, there could be a “significant” increase. Twitter (x) first debuted a crowd-sourced fact-checking program when the company was still known as #Twitter, and well before Musk’s 2022 takeover. But its focus on #CommunityNotes has increased under Musk’s ownership, and has recently been adopted by other companies, including #Meta Platforms Inc. and #ByteDance Ltd.’s #TikTok.

Musk himself has said Community Notes serves as a bulwark against #FalseInformation, calling it hoax kryptonite, but he is also regularly #flagged by the fact-checking process for posting misleading information.”

#ArtificialIntelligence / #AI / #AITools / #WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork / #KeithColeman / #x / #twitter <https://bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-07-01/x-will-deploy-ai-to-write-community-notes-expand-fact-checking> (paywall) / <https://archive.md/pk7Tg>

“The number of new #EntryLevel UK jobs has dropped by almost a third since the launch of ChatGPT, figures suggest, as companies use artificial intelligence to cut back the size of their workforces.

#Vacancies for #graduate jobs, #apprenticeships, #internships and #JuniorJobs with *no degree requirement* have dropped 32% since the launch of the #AIChatbot in November 2022, research by the job search site Adzuna released on Monday has found. These entry-level jobs now account for 25% of the market in the #UK, down from 28.9% in 2022.

Businesses are increasingly using #AI as a route to improve efficiency and reduce staff numbers. This month the chief executive of #BT, #AllisonKirkby, said advances in AI could presage deeper job cuts at the #telecoms company, after it outlined plans two years ago to shed between 40,000 and 55,000 #workers.”

#ArtificialIntelligence / #WhiteCollar / #ZeroHourWork <https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/jun/30/uk-entry-level-jobs-chatgpt-launch-adzuna>

“What seems rather dangerous about #Hollywood’s interest in #GenerativeAI isn’t the “death” of the larger #StudioSystem, but rather this #technology’s potential to make it easier for studios to work with *fewer actual people*.

That’s literally one of Asteria’s big selling points, and if its #workflows became the industry norm, it is hard to imagine it scaling in a way that could accommodate today’s #entertainment #workforce transitioning into new #careers.

As for what’s good about it, Mooser knows the right talking points. Now he has to show that his #tech — and all the changes it entails — can work.”

#AI / #ZeroHourWork / #software / #tooling / #AITools <https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/694687/asteria-bryn-mooser-uncanny-valley-gen-ai>