While it seems like A.I. is quickly becoming ubiquitous and inescapable, its increased influence and popularity hasn’t been without its hurdles. Amidst ongoing backlash about A.I. replacing people’s jobs, it was reported earlier this week that Amazon had been relying on more than 1,000 people in India to perform tasks related to its Just Walk Out technology that customers were led to believe was driven by A.I.


Advertisement


It was first announced that Amazon will be phasing out its Amazon Fresh stores that utilize Just Walk Out technology, which uses cameras and sensors to track what customers leave the store with, bypassing the need for cashiers. Instead, customers could simply scan a QR code when they entered the store, and they would be mailed a receipt after leaving.


The technology was introduced in 2016, and involved cashiers working overseas to watch footage, assign items to customers and mail them their receipts. As of 2022, 70 percent of Just Walk Out sales required human reviewers, falling far short of Amazon’s internal goal of less than 50 reviews per 1,000 sales.


Moving beyond Just Walk Out, Amazon will instead be introducing Dash Carts, shopping carts that come with scanners and screens embedded in them, allowing you to checkout as you shop. Like many innovations put forward by Silicon Valley execs, one has to wonder what problem they’re trying to address here — is waiting in line to checkout at the grocery store really that arduous? It’s hard not to think that all of this is little more than a way to cut costs by no longer employing cashiers.



Two prophetic TikTokers called this exact situation back in 2022, playing two Indians named Arjun and Imran who work behind-the-scenes at ChatGPT to help people write illuminating essays like, “Why Taylor Swift Should Be President” in a skit. Poor Arjun and Imran.


While Amazon is phasing Just Walk Out technology out, there will undoubtedly be countless other opportunities for Western corporations to exploit people in developing countries. Which begs the question: How worthwhile are technological innovations if they rely on the exploitation of others, not to mention if they rely on misleading the public about just how artificial your A.I.-powered technology is?