
Walmart patents surveillance tool that can eavesdrop on workers - jrwan
https://www.engadget.com/2018/07/12/walmart-patent-audio-surveillance-tool/
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salawat
...How much further are we going to let this sort of thing evolve?

This is classic Industrialist overreach. Taft-Hartley be damned. Enough is
enough. Corporate America needs a wake-up call, and I think the unions may
need to brush off the dust and get back in the game.

It's one thing to play with hypotheticals, but Corporations are starting to
leverage capital advantaged positions in order to dictate what values the
average American can expect in their lifetime.

It's a slow, insidious process that will happen over several generations, and
if a stand isn't made against this sort of thing, it qualifies as implicit
acceptance of the status quo.

If industry is going to try to build itself into a position where it can
micromanage every iota of the working day out of a perceived superior position
brought by cornering the "market" on economic power "capital", then labor
needs to be willing to say "have fun with that, we'll find another way to
survive."

I get this may come across as hyperbolic rhetoric, but it is absolutely INSANE
that people are thinking about IMPLEMENTING these sorts of things.

~~~
sillysaurus3
For any given website, if you can log in and chat with an employee, the
conversation is logged. This is normal.

If you call a corporation and chat with them, the conversation is recorded and
used for quality purposes. This is normal.

If you grab some groceries and ask to return one of the items you thought was
on sale but wasn't, and this fact is noted by an audio recording system,
suddenly this isn't normal.

I don't have feelings about this either way, but it's interesting to contrast
the situations.

~~~
salawat
Microphones and cameras don't just pick up "what you want". A key press is
more than appropriate to gather the desired "this isn't on sale" metric.

This device is also not intended for that use case. It's meant to generate
metrics to "ensure employees are actually greeting." If you are SO FLUSH WITH
CASH and in such a dearth of things to do with it that you are quite literally
trying to optimize your greeter metrics, there is a bloody problem.

Then there is the case that the very idea borders on abusive micromanagement.
The kind that can only be plausibly skated under the radar through copious use
of passive voice when describing it.

Life worked JUST FINE not being recorded audio/video or otherwise.

If profit hounding is reaching such high levels, a Wal-Mart greeter can't be
trusted to make a decision whether or not a customer is in the mood for a
greeting, then it is quite obvious that someone further up the chain has
completely lost touch with the idea of "Professional Courtesy".

Never mind that half of this metrics gathering wouldn't be necessary if the
company weren't trying to out grow the problem it's trying to solve by
hemorrhaging labor in favor of machines.

The modern community is rife with distrust. More and more, people drift
farther and farther away from each other. Mental and physical illness become
more and more serious problems as humans are increasingly expected to behave
as mass-produced cogs, interchangeable, and undeviating in how they carry out
their job. The human psyche doesn't cope well with that. Humans are DYNAMIC.
They are creative creatures, with difference being built into every decision.

The kind of control that industry keeps pushing for illustrates that
leadership has little, or deprioritizes any semblance of human respect and
dignity in how they engage with labor in favor of a more attractive bottom
line to attract investers.

It isn't innovation. It isn't improvement. It certainly isn't engaging with
and being a fundamental positive force within a community.

It's about plopping a pump down into a puddle of untapped value and sucking it
dry, to hell with the consequences for society, the community, or those we
leave behind to emulate the values we clearly espoused by letting it happen
unchallenged.

I don't know about anyone else, but this is disgusting behavior of a sort that
deserves more than mild degree of censure.

~~~
seem_2211
Agreed. This is insane at every level.

Let's play this out - imagine they implement this. They spend millions
(realistically tens/hundreds of millions) putting up sensor systems, spinning
up data center capacity, hiring analysts and all the auxiliary work that goes
along with this sort of program, all for what - to further dehumanize some
poor middle age single mother who's making $9 an hour? And for what -to
optimize some stupid metric?

Walmart would be far better off putting that money into the wages of their
lowest paid employees, or investing that money into manager training and
giving people on the ground help.

In my mind this is where inequality really starts to bite - this level of
surveillance at work is disproportionately aimed towards those with the least
power and agency.

~~~
loonyballoonys
It's like a game of chicken. Those in control of society make things worse and
the people at the bottom either suck it up or upend the table in response to
this new social contract.

People naturally want a stable peaceful life and will suck it up.

But one day this bluff will be called.

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emptybits
Not just "eavesdrop on workers". Also "eavesdrop on customers". The patent
itself tells us:

 _" the sound sensors can capture sounds resulting from guests talking while
waiting in line at a terminal or any other sounds resulting from the presence
of guest ... the sound sensors can capture audio of conversations between
guests and an employee stationed at the terminal. The system can process the
audio of the conversations to determine whether the employee stationed at the
terminal is greeting guests."_

[http://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?docid=10020004&SectionNum=1&IDK...](http://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?docid=10020004&SectionNum=1&IDKey=5052A1653B0F)

~~~
394549
I wonder how they'd make the required notifications to make this legal in one-
party consent states. I don't see how this could fly at all in a two-party
consent state.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_recording_laws#Unite...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_recording_laws#United_States)

~~~
Alupis
From what I recall, even in two-party states, simply informing the other party
is implicit consent, even if they say they do not consent to being recorded.
The only way to reject consent is to hang up the phone, ending the
conversation.

(one-party state means I know I'm recording the conversation, so it's legal -
I'm not obligated to inform the other party).

In stores, you'll often see a sign somewhere near the entrance that says
something like "Smile, you're on camera!", along with a CCTV showing the feed
- which is enough to implicitly consent recording when on the premises. If you
don't consent, you must leave the store.

So, I imagine a simple sign telling customers both audio and video
surveillance is being conducted will be sufficient.

~~~
jonnybgood
That’s just to deter people from stealing. In public spaces and semi-public
spaces consent does not need to be given. A store is considered a semi-public
space. There is no expectation of privacy in a store. Anyone can take pictures
of you and record you if they want and you legally cannot do anything about
it. You do not have to leave the store if you do not give consent unless you
don’t want to be recorded. You’re still going to be recorded in the parking
lot.

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fallingfrog
The realist in me knows that the people working at Wal Mart will accept this,
because in the end they have no choice. But when you continue to squeeze
people and control them more and more closely, eventually they wake up and
realize who has the real power. Eventually the guillotine rolls out, and
everything starts over.. Can we not do this this time?

~~~
citilife
The scary part is.. this time we have a much higher amount of control. Unless
people are unwilling to not use that knowledge / power, then we are going to
be less effective when the guillotine rolls out this time...

That being said, the initial Russian transition of power in WWI, where the
czar stepped down was without (minimal) violence.[1] This is before the
October revolution (which was violent).

[1] [https://www.english-online.at/history/russian-
revolution/rus...](https://www.english-online.at/history/russian-
revolution/russian-revolution-and-civil-war.htm)

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madamelic
I have always been super supportive of automation and I think it is a net-
positive.

But today I had a weird experience. You know those automated ordering things
at fast food places, I used one for the first time today. It was exciting and
fun at first (don't judge me), but then I looked up and realized no one was at
the register and no one was speaking. The workers were simply packing bags and
pressing buttons. It was a cold transaction between two humans, the human
workers could've been robots and accomplished the same thing.

It makes me a little worried and sad that automation will cause our lives to
be completely sterile and cold. No human interaction, just pressing buttons
and staring blankly at each other.

~~~
sandworm101
You skirt around the probably motivation behind those machines. It isn't about
speeding the order process, it is about removing language from the equation.
At some basic level, the person taking the order must have language in common
with the person placing the order. Throw a machine into the mix and you no
longer need that commonalty. The person behind the counter no longer needs to
speak the same language as the customer. Every time they remove such
requirements they make labor that little bit easier to replace.

I'll admit to occasionally hitting the drive through on my way to work. It is
odd to say, but that brief interaction through the window is the one time I'll
talk to a stranger all day. (I work behind guarded doors and security
barriers.) I don't want that person replaced by a machine.

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pasbesoin
As far as I'm concerned, I'm hired to do a job. Not be a (coerced) actor to
every last dimension of my expression.

That's a much harder job. And if they insist on that, they can damned well pay
-- a lot more -- for it.

And that's where the group of the impacted have to and, as far as I'm
concerned, have the right to come together and say so.

Meantime, Walmart, as a tax payer, I'm tired of paying for your b-llshit
(public benefits to full-time or should-be-full-time employees, ridiculous tax
breaks (that go to the top, not the bottom), and all the rest).

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loa-in-backup
> "[change relations to those] where employees view the employer not as
> benevolent, but as dictators."

It was never the former, but really can become the latter.

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thisisit
> ways that will help us further enhance how we serve customers

Further enhance? Why?

~~~
extralego
innovation and a better tomorrow

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trophycase
This has got to stop people. I'm serious. We need to take collective action
and do something before this stuff gets out of hand. Anyone got some resources
on getting involved?

~~~
thetruepickle5
Get a copy of The Anarchist's Cookbook, conveniently available at Amazon :)

~~~
danesparza
The author now sees the premise to his own book as 'flawed':
[https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/19/anarch...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/19/anarchist-
cookbook-author-william-powell-out-of-print)

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AstralStorm
It will probably be time to figure out right doodads to break all this
surveillance, permanently. As a customer, to protest the practice.

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diogenescynic
A union busting patent? Sickening. How is this allowed? I thought
eavesdropping/recording an unknown wasn't allowed in many states.

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gcb0
won't it infrige on amazon's surveillance of clients for their workerless shop
full of microphones and cameras?

~~~
Someone1234
Is this a reference to something specific?

~~~
stephengillie
Supposedly, Amazon employees watch the cameras in their stores, to know which
Prime account to charge for which item. It sounds like a step between self-
check and scan-bag-go, with a "mechanical Turk" to bridge the gap - turn Loss
Prevention into legitimate checkout and a profit center.

~~~
russdpale
lol so THAT is why they are so coy about how the system actually works. My
neice asked one of the employees and he was constantly giving dodgy answers to
everyone. I figured they just didn't want any employee letting any proprietary
knowledge out..

