- Date: February 28th, 2025
- Time: 12:00 PM - 1:30 PM
- Format: In person and online
- Location: HQ 276
You can access our RSVP page via: https://forms.office.com/r/BMB0Ue5vAB
Abstract from the Author:
This talk explores a persistent phenomenon in AI development: the recurring promise of complete automation that perpetually remains just out of reach while obscuring the essential human labor that powers AI systems. Drawing from global research on AI production networks, he examines how the narrative of inevitable total automation serves to hide the growing workforce of data laborers, content moderators, and infrastructure maintenance workers. Casilli analyzes this ‘Godot Effect’ across multiple sectors and proposes new frameworks for understanding AI not as a purely technological system but as a manifestation of capitalist labor practices that thrive on colonial exploitation and global workforce invisibility.
Bio of the Author:
Antonio Casilli is a Professor of Sociology at the Institut Polytechnique de Paris and a member of the CNRS Interdisciplinary Institute on Innovation. His research focuses on digital labor, AI workers’ rights, and platform capitalism. His influential publications have been translated into several languages. His latest book, originally published in French as “En attendant les robots” (Seuil, 2019), has been published in English by the University of Chicago Press as “Waiting for Robots” (2025). He has co-founded several international initiatives, including the research program DiPLab (Digital Platform Labor) and INDL (International Network on Digital Labor).
This event is presented by the American Studies Program, the Department of Computer Science, and the Yale AI Policy Group and sponsored by the Critical Computing Initiative and the MacMillan Center. Feel free to reach out to Grace Vitale (grace.vitale@yale.edu) with any questions.