Behind the Scenes of Automation: Ghostly Care-Work, Maintenance, and Interferences: Exploring participatory practices and methods to uncover the ghostly presence of humans and human labor in automation

Industry and media have long represented automation as a harbinger of development and convenience in different areas of life. An anxious prospect to some, automation systems promise “progress” and profitability to others by conjuring corporate computational futures. What remains behind the scenes of these predictions and imaginaries of automation is the invisible human labor of global ghost workers caring for, maintaining, and repairing technologies. Invisible but irreplaceable, computation performed by humans in precarious conditions fills gaps that computer technologies lack skills and sensibility for. In this hybrid workshop, we ask who the “ghosts” are in the machines. The workshop will address the ghostly presence of humans and human labor in automation and its challenges to HCI research and design.