According to The Information, Meta is paying creators such as Snoop Dogg millions for AI chatbots, with the top creator making as much as $5 million over two years for six hours of work in a studio. During Meta’s Connect event in September, Mark Zuckerberg announced that Meta will be integrating new AI assistants across its social media platforms that can have human-like conversations. While the company has its own AI chatbot similar to ChatGPT, it has now introduced 28 new ones with different personalities that use celebrities’ images. These
Diversity programs continue to come under fire as Meta Platforms Inc. and three entertainment groups face lawsuits. What has been happening? Since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against colleges and universities considering race in their admissions process and ending Affirmative Action, there have been several lawsuits against diversity programs. Following that, conservative group American Alliance for Equal Rights, led by Edward Blum, filed lawsuits against law firms Perkins Coie and Morrison Foerster, challenging their diversity fellowships. The lawsuits alleged these fellowships unlawfully discriminated against white candidates and requested that racial
A leaked internal document from TikTok revealed that the company is preparing for scrutiny over the treatment of its outsourced content moderators in Kenya. Kenyan Content Moderators Sue Meta Last month, a court in Kenya issued a landmark ruling against Meta, deeming the US tech giant the “true employer” of its outsourced content moderators. Hundreds of content moderators in Nairobi go through posts and images to filter out violence, hate speech, and other disturbing content. This ruling now allows Meta to be sued in Kenya for labor rights violations, despite
A Kenyan court has ruled that Meta is the primary employer of content moderators involved in a lawsuit against the social media giant and is prohibited from laying them off until the case is resolved. In March, the moderators, who worked for Meta’s content review partner, Sama, filed a lawsuit accusing Meta, Sama and a second subcontractor, Majorel, of union-busting operation masquerading as a mass redundancy. Meta sought to dismiss the case, arguing that it was outside the jurisdiction of Kenyan courts. However, the court rejected Meta’s claim and asserted its
Renowned tennis champion Naomi Osaka has forayed into the world of digital fashion in a new partnership with Meta Avatars. Osaka has unveiled her flagship digital apparel collection that showcases her unique sense of style which she describes as “eclectic, unpredictable, yet comfortably cool.” The collection launched on Wednesday with five outfits that draw inspiration from her Haitian and Japanese heritage, her love for tennis, her media company Hana Kuma, and even her beloved dog Butta. “Being able to take trends from the real world and translate into the metaverse
In a watershed moment for the global tech industry, more than 150 African content moderators—who have provided moderation services for AI tools used by Facebook, TikTok, and ChatGPT—have voted to unionize, TIME reports. At an event in Nairobi this week, content moderators employed by third-party outsourcing companies voted to establish the first African Content Moderators Union. A long time coming The union’s establishment is the culmination of a process that began in 2019 when former Facebook content moderator Daniel Motaung was fired after attempting to unionize workers at the outsourcing
Tech giant Meta is being sued by content moderators in Kenya, again. On Monday, 43 content moderators filed a lawsuit accusing Facebook’s parent company and two subcontractors, Sama and Majorel of ‘unlawful redundancy’ and discriminatory hiring practices. Meta had contracted Kenya-based firm Sama to moderate Facebook content in eastern and southern Africa. However, Sama closed its content moderation arm in January and announced it would be laying off 260 content moderators when its contract with Meta ends on March 31. The suit claims that redundancy notices were not issued and that Meta and Sama
Content moderation on social media has taken a turn for the worse. Meta has announced that their leading subcontractor for content moderation in Africa, Sama, has officially closed. The third-party contractor, contracted by the owner of Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram, has decided to move away from policing harmful content, resulting in several employees without work permits. Following the announcement, 200 employees from the moderation hub in Kenya – representing approximately 3% of the team – will be let go. The news announced on Tuesday, comes months after Meta was sued in East
Mass tech layoffs are shaking up the industry and dominating weekly news headlines. From Twitter’s mass layoffs to Meta announcing that they will cut 13% of its workforce, the industry is facing a ‘stormy winter.’ The H-1B Visa Program Mass tech layoffs have left thousands of employees worldwide in a challenging situation. Many will move on to get other jobs in the industry, whereas workers on temporary visas will not be able to do that. Workers with temporary visas have been left with little to no time to find another
Last month, Kenya’s ICT Minister announced that it had no plans to ban Facebook or shut down the Internet despite reports emerging that the platform is failing to combat hate speech that could lead to election violence. The statement came after Global Witness, an advocacy group, and Foxglove, a non-profit legal firm, released a report stating that Facebook “appallingly failed to detect hate speech ads in the two official languages of the country: Swahili and English.” Although Facebook released a blog post on July 20th that detailed its plans to combat
