[disillusioned]

Well, it's being framed both ways.

Lazy folks are framing this as "see, it's still humans!", like this awful article by TechSpot headlined "Waymo admits that its autopilot is often just guys from the Philippines": https://www.techspot.com/news/111233-waymo-admits-autopilot-...

1) "Often" is a gross mischaracterization. It's so infrequent you wouldn't believe. Nearly all rides are performed fully autonomously without human intervention. But "often" sure sounds spicy!

2) "its autopilot is just guys from the Philippines": no, it's not. A human is in the loop to help hint to the Waymo Driver AI platform what action to take if its confidence level is too low or it's facing a particularly odd edge case where it needs to be nudged to take an alternate route. This framing makes it sound like some dude in Manilla is remote controlling the car. They're not. They're issuing hints to and confirming choices by the Waymo Driver which remains in full control of the vehicle at all times.

Because lay people, even non-technically-sophisticated lay people naturally start wondering "well, isn't there some delay between a person in the Philippines and the car in the US? how could that be safe? what if the internet dips out or the connection drops?" Which are good and valid points! And why this framing is so obnoxious and lazy. The car is always driving itself.

They finally issued a correction in the linked article that makes it clear they're not remote controlling the cars, but the headline is still really slanted and a frustrating framing. When you ride in these things, you can see just how incredible this technology is and how far we've come.

[bsimpson]

There's also the implicit xenophobia/offshoring angle that people in a call center in the Philippines must be doing low quality work and/or being exploited.

[tbrownaw]

I think people tend to distrust an assumed lowest bidder regardless of whether they're from here or from over there.

[seanmcdirmid]

I would guess they are not only getting lower rates in the Philippines, but better service than they could get in the states.

[hsbauauvhabzb]

Because outsourced work is often a race to the bottom price wise, resulting in skilled workers finding better higher paying work elsewhere?

There are highly talented people in every country. The vast majority of them do not work in call centres.

[BobbyTables2]

Well they are being exploited for potentially illegal purposes.

Forget self driving cars for a minute. If Domino’s wants to deliver a pizza to me, the delivery car driver needs to be licensed (pretty much in that state).

It doesn’t matter even if Domino’s extends some sort of liability insurance. Laws are laws. Legally driver must be licensed. It doesn’t matter if they drive while on a speakerphone call with a licensed driver.

It also wouldn’t matter if the delivery driver had no license but carried a licensed passenger at all times. It wouldn’t matter even if the passenger owned the car.

Having a person drive a car in a country in which they are not licensed to drive seems fundamentally illegal. It’s not a technology issue. It doesn’t matter if there are sensors and satellite links involved. The driver must be licensed.

Somehow society had decided in favor of a little convenience to forget all principles and let tech companies run roughshod over laws, societal norms, and basic human decency.

This is worse than the 1970s mentality of “if it came from the computer it must be correct”. Now it is AI…

[peyton]

Should probably be licensed to drive in the US if “explicitly proposing a path for the vehicle to consider” as Waymo has disclosed…

I would not personally be comfortable “explicitly proposing a path” for a vehicle operating in the Philippines since I’ve never even been there, let alone driven there. Why would I be comfortable with somebody doing the reverse?

[gjm11]

It seems possible that people in the Philippines providing advice to Waymo vehicles in the US get some training on US road signage, traffic regulations, etc. (I can't see how it would make any sense for Waymo to pay people to do this and not give them the information they need to do it reasonably well, since the whole point is for them to handle difficult cases.)

[Brybry]

And it would be difficult for whatever training Waymo provides to its employees to be less stringent than the lax license requirements of most US states.

[catlikesshrimp]

Super interesting take you mentiom.

Tourists can drive in the US on their foreign license. Can that be used as a loophole for a call center?

Also, maybe it is a gray area where they are not asking what they don't want to hear. Those offshore subcontractors already break any US law they want because they aren't hiring humans inside the US, they are providing a service from abroad.

Specifically, how do you know the operator can drive?, as you ask. But also, how do you know your operator won't steal your PII / bank account details out of your law enforcement physical jurisdiction?

[legostormtroopr]

Why is it xenophobic to be concerned that non-registered drivers in one country are being allowed to drive remotely in a different country.

[MostlyStable]

As far as I understand it, they aren't being allowed to drive. They are doing the equivalent of "ignore that, it's not a real obstacle" or "try to go around this way", and then the car takes that input into account and does the actual driving (steering, control of throttle/brake) on it's own as usual.

[dataflow]

You're saying they don't interpret road signs/markings/etc.? Or need to know if e.g. a right or left turn on red is legal in a given intersection?

[rcxdude]

I don't need, legally, to demonstrate any knowledge of this to drive on US roads currently (or even, strictly speaking, to know what side of the road I should drive on).

[tbrownaw]

It's been quite a while, but I'm pretty sure there was a written part back when I did the driving test for my first license.

[MostlyStable]

No, I'm saying that no one should be "concerned that non-registered drivers in one country are being allowed to drive remotely in a different country" because they aren't driving.

[agumonkey]

It might be for non road code level issues, like physics / crowd ambiguity, where a normal human could fill the missing gaps, US citizen or not.

[dylan604]

One that I heard a lot is that if you're in the US during the day talking to an offshored tech support person, it's the middle of the night for them. The A-team doesn't work overnight, so you're getting at best second tier. blah blah

[catlikesshrimp]

The guy says there are workers abroad, not exclusively in Phillipines. Phillipine call centers work when it is night in the US. There almost certainly is /are other centers in another location which work when it is daytime in the US.

Because Night shifts are always more expensive. Nothing to do with any A, B or C Team.

Edir: "Markey then asked about where the operators are located, to which Peña says they have "some in the U.S. and some abroad,” however he did not know an exact percentage of those located elsewhere. "

[WillPostForFood]

The way the Waymo rep answered strongly implied they only have workers on this task in the The Philippines.

--

Markey: In what countries are these employees located?

Waymo guy: The Philippines.

Markey: Excuse me?

Waymo guy: the Philippines.

Markey: So they are in the Philippines.

----

If they aren't in the Philippines, they need to fire Waymo guy..

[catlikesshrimp]

He gave a non answer, quite surely on purpose. Since the interviewer didn't explicitly ask "Only in the Phillipines?", I can see the guy retorting "I never said there weren't operators in other places" (again, without saying which other places, or even if there is any other place)

[WillPostForFood]

Definitely possible, but the more likely answer is that the Phillipines is the only foreign country with operators.

[TurdF3rguson]

It probably has more to do with the fact that Filipinos speak english. There's no other countries like that in Asia. I mean, Singapore I guess, but they're busy with their own things.

[jcranmer]

I think it is more specifically that Filipinos tend to speak English with a more American accent, unlike English-speakers in (say) India.

[BobbyTables2]

Well people in India drive on the left side of the road… That’s not going to work out well when controlling a car in the US…

(Their societal norms regarding driving habits also aren’t going to be an asset)

[seanmcdirmid]

Thailand has good enough English, but is probably too expensive with wages on par with China.

[TurdF3rguson]

Thailand doesn't have good enough English to make call centers there viable.

[OGEnthusiast]

Why is it xenophobia if it could be true?

[GuinansEyebrows]

as someone with zero love for waymo/alphabet, why would you believe it to be true?

[OGEnthusiast]

I'm not saying it's true or not true, I'm saying I don't know what "xenophobia" has to do with evaluating the quality of workers being used in potentially life-saving situations.

[tialaramex]

I'd have a way easier time buying the idea that there's genuine concern for the quality of this work if say, few Americans old enough to do so were licensed to drive. But er, actually it's estimated at almost 90% because the standards are extremely lax.

What "potentially life-saving situations" are you envisioning?

Here's a Waymo article so you have some idea what we're actually talking about: https://waymo.com/blog/2024/05/fleet-response/

Edited: Clarify by removing negation

[catlikesshrimp]

Nobody had mentioned any evaluation of anything. The Grandparent mentioned that xenophobia makes the headline more spicy. "Remote operator" phrase is not as attractive as "Remote operators from Phillipines" or even "Pinoys" can be.

Edit: "They finally issued a correction in the linked article that makes it clear they're not remote controlling the cars, but the headline is still really slanted and a frustrating framing"

[danielmarkbruce]

If you think they are doing bad work because they are in country X for any X, it's xenophobia.

[jayd16]

Offshoring our good, American, pretending to be a robot car jobs.

[amiga386]

They are being exploited. They live in a lower cost-of-living country than where their services are rendered, and so neither demand nor receive the same wages as someone in the USA. The contracting company profits - quite intentionally! - from labour arbitrage.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/Outsourc...

[mediaman]

People from the West always complain when people from the developing world are hired to do work for people in the west.

They got angry about China, the Philippines, India, Kenya.

Oddly, it’s never the people in those countries complaining that they got a better paying job!

Only rich people who think, apparently, that this new middle class ought to be kicked back to the farm fields.

[amiga386]

The fact that other countries receive investment, which they welcome, doesn't mean they're not being exploited.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploitation_of_labour#In_deve...

The Western companies who employ or contract people in these other countries aren't altruistically investing. They're on the hunt for people who will accept lower wages, and for governments that won't insist on workers rights, health and safety.

[hackable_sand]

They should be paid American wages

[JumpCrisscross]

> They are being exploited. They live in a lower cost-of-living country

So tech companies should be barred from hiring anyone outside the Bay Area? Because hiring someone in Texas or Arizona is necessarily exploitation?

[amiga386]

Hiring specifically in Texas or Arizona because you heard it's lower cost-of-living than the Bay Area, and not being willing to offer Bay Area salaries to people there... that's still exploitation.

If you were instead hiring from anywhere (because you'd be happy with a remote worker, and they have the same employment rights) and willing to pay the same as you'd pay your Bay Area workers, i.e. it's about the hunt for talented/capable employees whereever they might be, rather than a hunt for cheap ones, that's no longer exploitation.

[dekhn]

Shouldn't pay be scaled to the locale? Note also the role here is fungible- Waymo could move to another location if they chose.

[OGEnthusiast]

Yeah but ironically it's actually the workers in the US who are being exploited. The workers in the developing countries are largely beneficiaries since they get access to wages and a labor market far beyond their local region. (Obviously the companies still benefit the most.)

[nathanaldensr]

They are being exploited. I've traveled to Cebu City where many of these call centers are located. My wife is from the area. To Filipinos, it's a good job, but the quality of life for these workers is still very poor. It's not a living wage; most can't afford to live on their own.

[simonw]

"most can't afford to live on their own"

That's true for a lot of workers in many USA cities as well.

[TurdF3rguson]

It's a good job but they can't live on it? I think you mean they can't live like westerners.

[orwin]

No, I have a friend from Madagascar where they have the same type of 'jobs' (basically classifying stuff for AI, or checking reported images to see if it's porn or worse). It is a 'good job' in the sense that it's a 'desk' job you can do at home that also signal education, so it's social value is high. It is also very 'competitive' so the pay is low and the hours to live on it approach 90/week (it's a 12h/day job)

[TurdF3rguson]

No I'm familiar with the call center jobs op means, they're good paying (for the region) but you have to go in to the physical location in the city. Which usually means paying rent or a long commute.

[124816]

It's not lazy framing, this is what "journalism" is now. Push your agenda as far as you can, misrepresenting as many facts as you like. At the very end of your story -- which >85% will never get to -- walk back your misdirections with a paragraph or two of facts, right next to your bolded "sign up" text. None of this is unintentional or accidental.

[mnky9800n]

I think in response to the propaganda and opinion that has been passed as journalism there are very compelling new journalism outlets like bellingcat. So there is hope and probably space for journalism that fills this gap.

[padjo]

If it's so infrequent why do they need to offshore it?

[loeg]

Infrequent things happen all the time at scale?

[strange_quark]

Their scale is like 2000 cars…

[lern_too_spel]

They're scaling exponentially, so they have to plan operations accordingly.

[fyredge]

A. ML engineers don't want to do it B. Phillipine labellers are way cheaper C. All of the above

[snowwrestler]

Time zone coverage would be an obvious reason to have overseas teams.

[dymk]

Because it's cheaper, duh

[bigwheels]

The fleet of human operators manage many details of Waymo rides.

* Interpreting traffic laws

* Managing construction

* Navigating unusual intersections

* Re-routing due to traffic or other unusual conditions

* Safety threshold intervene

[steveBK123]

Well one concern could be something like - ride share companies already extracted a lot of the profit share of local taxi companies out of their local economies and moved it to Silicon Valley. But at least there were local jobs so a good amount of money stayed in the local economy.

Now with driverless all the money leaves the local economy to go to Silicon Valley. And then what human labor is required is then offshored.

[turtlesdown11]

I assume you have sources for the claims you're making above? Like actual data on the number of people employed doing this work, how often they "guide" the car, etc? Otherwise it's hard to believe your claims.

Interesting, an immediate downvote asking for sources.

[OGEnthusiast]

> It's so infrequent you wouldn't believe

Is there a publicly disclosed number we can use to verify this claim?

[bobsomers]

This is purely anecdotal but I've heard from other riders that the car tells you when it's happening, and it's never happened in my 10+ rides so far.

[RupertSalt]

Yes, the display will chime and indicate "We're working to help you get moving again" and "Sit tight and keep your seatbelt fastened." Support may call in if necessary. Or if you've reached out to Support, they'll explain that they're going to send a command to the vehicle or modify the route.

It's not unusual and it's quite a routine mode. It will happen if there's a jam in front of you, like a parking lot or narrow passage. Twice, we were behind a marked police car that was sort of double-parked. You'll know Support is imminent when the car is hesitating, and the virtual reality may indicate multiple-choice paths.

It happened to me once today at a "valet parking" stand, in a very busy drop-off circle. (I traveled about 25 miles.) I was also cracking up, because it chose a lot of backroads for the routes, which could've been done on arterials. So I was treated to a real "scenic route" at no extra charge. But Support never called in, and the delay so brief, I am unsure whether their input was necessary to clear the way.

I did once receive a human driver to move the car. The dropoff was in the wrong United States lot, and when I told them I couldn't exit there, they said the battery was so low it needed the American Depot ASAP and wouldn't obey, so an American human was dispatched from The United States of America, and moved it a couple hundred yards... or meters, if you're Pinoy. It was a distinct process for her to climb in and disengage the Waymo Driver, but otherwise just a normal American thing. I mean, she was required to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, show her ID to the camera, and finish by singing the Star-Spangled Banner, but otherwise it was normal, and could've happened anywhere. God Bless Waymo.

[pydry]

"So infrequent that we wouldnt believe" and yet in order to save costs they had to use humans from the Phillipines?

[groundtruthdev]

This defense is missing the point. Yes, humans aren’t remote-driving the cars, and yes, most miles are autonomous. But the relevant question isn’t how often a human intervenes — it’s how many humans must be continuously available for the system to function at all. Even if interventions are rare, Waymo still needs operators on shift, fully alert, low-latency, and trained for local conditions, and that cost exists whether they’re doing something or not. Capacity planning is driven by correlated failures, not averages: blackouts, construction, special events, and weather can cause many vehicles to request help at once, and we’ve already seen queues form. That means the human layer is sized for worst-case concurrency, not “99.99% of miles.” So no, it’s not “just guys in the Philippines driving cars,” but it’s also not “so infrequent you wouldn’t believe.” It’s a highly autonomous system with a permanent human ops shadow, and the fact that this work is offshored strongly suggests that shadow is economically material. Miles are autonomous. Ops are not.