Transcripts For BBCNEWS Click 20240713

Its time for click. This week the perils of the gig economy. Checking for allergens. And. Fake birds. Its kind of hard to remember a time when we didnt have taxi hailing apps. And when i say taxi hailing apps, even though there are many more players out there, it is uber that comes to mind first. At its conception a decade ago, uber was really disruptive. I mean, the idea that you could have a taxi to you within minutes, it would know exactly where you were, you could see where it was and you didnt even have to have any money on you. I mean, it was revolutionary. The company grew at a rapid pace, becoming the highest valued start up in the world. This without ever turning a profit. In fact, in the last three months alone, uber lost an eye watering 5. 2 billion. Undeterred, uber continues to expand and has its name stamped onto many apps that provide different types of services, all part of the so called gig economy. Now, it has faced a lot of backlash in many of the countries that it operates in from taxidrivers who have been losing out because of the platforms aggressive pricing strategies and from city authorities whove raised concerns over workers rights and passenger safety. Here in london, the transport authority says it too has concerns about passenger safety, and it will decide later this month whether to renew ubers licence. In the meantime, carl miller has met up with an uber driver who has concerns too, although this is about how uber controls his livelihood. Its monday morning and im catching a ride with hadi. Another one. Like so many parts of the Digital World, the gig economy was supposed to be a liberation. You 0k . Apps like uber were supposed to transform how you worked, work when you want, where you want. But now, many fear that whether it was either in the platforms and how they work or the data and how its collected, they dontjust represent a liberation, but also Something Else a potent new form of control as well. What i was told is that the closest driver gets thatjob, but i dont believe that to be right, cause what happens is ive seen customers sitting in my car, trying to book a ride and its not bouncing to me, its actually going to drivers who are far away, five, ten minutes. That was something i really couldnt believe, so we gave it a go. But although i was physically sitting next to him, the job went to someone several minutes away. Uber has now introduced a system that aims to reduce the waiting time for everyone, not just a particular passenger. And this may lead to the counter intuitive situation where your driver can get to someone else quickly and another driver can pick you up soon too. Confused . Well, so is hadi. And although the driver app gives some information, hes struggling to understand what factors really determine how work is allocated. In his five years of driving, the work has become scarcer. Its becoming even more important to hadi to understand the algorithm that actually allocates the work that exists. Important, but also unknown. You drive around all day, thinking maybe thats the best way to beat this algorithm or to meet up with the algorithm that has set. Carl, i dont know whats going on. On an average, i used to work six to eight hours, five to six days a week. The number of days have not changed but the hours have increased. It will still be ten to 12 hours, five to six days a week. After costs are factored in, hadi says he and many of his colleagues are often struggling to make even the minimum wage. Ive seen drivers sleeping in theircar parking, actually, and you see them, basically, they have gone to sleep because they have overworked. Not only for hadi, but plenty of other drivers as well, is actually, if you think about it, the algorithm that lets him feed and clothe his family. Its cold, hard maths, but with tremendously human consequences. Unfortunately, we all depend on the algorithm. What we want from it to be fair, to be transparent. Thats the most important thing. There was only one way for hadi to actually figure out whats been going on asking for his data. And when he got it back, it made things even more confusing. James farrar established the Worker Info Exchange to help people across the gig economy to actually make sense of their data. He told us the information hadi received refers from everything from speed to battery level, but, crucially, doesnt reveal the things he really wants to know such as rates of pay or the actual time spent on the platform and how to optimise his chances of earning more money. Drivers always want to understand that theyre getting a fair deal, that the value, the quality, the quantity of the work is fairly distributed. Well, uber has always proposed to its workforce that the workforce, drivers are their own boss, theyre free to make their own choices, they are effectively running their own business. But if thats true, then i must be able to access the endless amounts of data im creating for uber every day. But could it also be a matter of the complicated and hidden nature of the information algorithms involved . The way in which, for instance, drivers and passengers are matched via a platform is a complex calculation, and so the gig Economy Today is considerably more complex and that means that the questions around how scores are calculated, how data are utilised and how that can be taken into account by Service Providers that question is more important than it ever was. But a joint study between oxford researchers and uber itself found that on average, drivers earned above london living wage and reported they were happier than the average worker across the city. Critics question, though, whether the full costs of being an uber driver have really been factored in when those figures were arrived at. The same arguments now playing out in the streets of london have happened in the city after city across the world. In what might have been a global first, the powerful taxi and Limousine Commission in new york didnt just ask uber for data, but demand it, and until uber handed it over, they were banned from operating. What we found out was that conditions were worse than what was being described to us by drivers. 96 of drivers were making less than the citys minimum wage, but without that information, you only have anecdotes, you have stories from drivers about low wages, but you have no way to really quantify that, and without quantifying it, you cant create a policy to bring those levels of wages up. In response, uber said another brilliant report from carl there. And, carl, if you could just sum up your thoughts another brilliant report from carl there. And, carl, if you could just sum up your thoughts about whether the gig economy really is eroding workers rights, notjust pay, but workers rights in general . I mean, in some sense, it really has to. I mean, these are kind of old, old issues that seem to be being now raised in different ways. You know, it used to be struggles of employees over rights. Now, its the struggle of workers to be recognised as employees at all. It used to be struggle over control of the shop floor, now its struggle over data. These are issues, really, that if you think about it, stretch back hundreds of years. But theyre now being raised in all these strange new forms as the work increasingly transfers onto these platforms. Do you think weve been foolish to believe that the gig economy will be better than having traditionaljobs . Well, its that paradox, its both a deliberation and a new form of control both in the same thing. So, we believed part of it and we were right to it is bringing flexible new forms of work, but its also bringing these new hidden forms of control, i think, which because theyre kind of working through the tech, through the complex way it works and in data, its actually quite hard for us to see or to kind of recognise is there in the first place. Ok, if we can move on in a few weeks time, youre going to be doing what i think is quite a groundbreaking report for us here on click. So, in the week of the general election here in the uk, carl is going to be looking at the type of outrage and anger that flows across social media to and from members of parliament and candidates is that right . Thats right. I mean, this is the free for all election. I mean, i dont think were ever going to see a larger gap between the influence of the Digital World on the outcome of the vote and the influence of laws on the Digital World. Its a free for all. The Digital World has become unbelievably important for campaigning, for the candidates and, of course, for everyone to learn more about politics. At the same time, the laws just simply havent kept up, they havent extended to the Digital World. So, were going to desperately be trying to track, i think, one of the major social outcomes of consequences of whats happening, which is simply that everyone is getting angrier with almost everyone else across society. It seems at the moment that were massively polarised and were also very angry. Do you think the two go hand in hand, and maybe in a future where were not so polarised, we wont be as angry, or do you think everything and everyone isjust getting more hyperbolic, angrier online . And that will lead to just more polarisation forever. I think its this powerful yet intricate interplay between the Digital World and Everything Else happening in society. So, theres lots of things which have nothing to do with Digital Technology for why were angry. Of course there is. But i think its the platforms we live on, the way in which information flows around is actually part of that story as well. Were only seeing certain kinds of information, were only speaking to certain kinds of people, were seeing cherry picked facts from the other side being slotted into our own timelines and so on, and all that is part of the story. The platform engine has visible rules which determine what you see, what you experience online, how these platforms work that is definitely, i think, leading us towards anger rather than the opposite. Look at the glee in his face we look forward to it, carl. Good luck with your research. Thanks. Hello and welcome to the week in tech. It was the week disney officially entered the streaming market. Well, it didnt quite go to plan. Disney finally went live in the us, canada and the netherlands, but customers reported technical issues with many unable to connect. Disney said demand had exceeded its highest expectations. Maybe ralph really did break the internet after all . In the fastest backflip and u turn since. Well, sonic, the updated and redesigned hedgehog has been officially revealed in a new trailer for the upcoming live action movie. The original trailer drew a deluge of complaints and mockery over the original cgi design of sonic himself, forcing animators quite literally back to the drawing board. From spinning hedgehogs to backflipping robots. These footballing flipping robots from mit are called the mini cheetah. Its creators claim it is virtually indestructible and can right itself if it falls down. As well as some smooth soccer skills, its also capable of working over uneven terrain twice as fast as a human. Lets hope it cant climb trees. And finally, in other robot news, if youre one of those people that dont like speaking to shop assistants, maybe youd rather direct your questions to one of these welcoming faces instead. This humanoid shop assistant from Russian Company promobot can apparently show emotion and they claim they can make photorealistic clones like these Arnold Schwarzenegger and Albert Einstein dolls. Greeted by these in store, would it be hasta la vista . Or will you be back . You decide. For those with serious food allergies, knowing exactly what youre eating can be a matter of life or death. When it comes to packaged food, the ingredients are normally clearly on the label, plus a warning if it may contain traces of nuts or any other allergens. But when it comes to eating in someone elses house or in a restaurant, things get a little bit more complicated. So, if you want to add an extra level of checking what those ingredients are, well, ive been putting some technology to the test that might be able to help. This is nima. Now, theres a version that tests for gluten and another that tests for peanuts. The idea is that you put in a small sample of the food that youre eating, as small as a pea, into one of these capsules. That goes inside the device, which syncs up to your smartphone, and you can find out whether the ingredient you cant eat is in it or not. Im going to put both of them to the test with this cookie, which should contain gluten but shouldnt contain nuts. The device uses antibody based chemistry born out of Mit Technology to detect proteins or allergen. The companys algorithms then translating complex science into a smiley go ahead and eat it face or not. This is a pricey occupation, though. Each one time use capsule currently setting you back five whole dollars. And the company does advise that this is an extra level of checking on top of your normal Due Diligence and, of course, carrying any medication. Ok, well, i can confirm that the device definitely got this correct. It says that gluten has been found. It comes up here on the device and you can see here on the phone, 12 30pm today, gluten has been found. If i tap on that, it gives me the option of notjust making a note for myself so i remember, but also sharing the data to the nima database. And, of course, as more people use these devices, that database will start to become a lot more valuable. Lets give the peanut tester a go. You can do this with liquids or solids. And we have a result in the form of a smiley face. During my limited experiments, the results were accurate. But i am, of course, only tested a small piece of each but i am, of course, only testing a small piece of each bit of food. So im working on the basis that the ingredients are consistent throughout. Whilst they are an entirely different entity, food intolerances can have a huge impact on peoples lives, too. I tested this at prototype stage but now, i have the finished version of foodmarble here. This is a digestion tracking device. Now, the way it works as you breathe into this little hole here and it will track how much hydrogen there is in your breath. The idea behind this is that if youve eaten something that you havent managed to digest properly, then a small amount of hydrogen is released into the bloodstream. That makes its way into your lungs, and from your lungs into your breath. So you can figure out which foods might be affecting you negatively. Once you have a reading, you can sync that data up within the app with any sleep data or how stressed youre feeling, so that you can measure up the factors to see if there is any correlation. You can manually make a note of symptoms, too, and you can log all the ingredients that youve eaten in a meal. So, how much use are these readings, taken at any given time . I think that the danger of that kind of result or variability would be that it might end up with you not knowing where you are and restricting your diet in all sorts of ways. And you could compensate so that you didnt lose weight, for example, and become obviously malnourished, but subtle deficiencies of micronutrients that are important. But there is a secondary use the device hopes to fulfil and that should be able to really isolate the issue. The device can also be used to do food intolerance testing. Now, for that, it would require some fasting and you use a different mode thats within the app but it comes with these samples of inulin, lactose, sorbitol and fructose to test the common intolerances. It does seem to be as accurate as the big machines we use to measure hydrogen in the clinic or in the laboratory in the hospital. My problem with it being practical is that there are many people who have primarily methane producing bacterial populations and what if youve actually got something really badly wrong with your intestine, and youre putting down all of these symptoms due to irritable gut, nerves and intolerance of foods . And yet, youve actually got Crohns Disease or coeliac disease. Or what if you are a slightly older person and actually, you know, you think youre too busy to go to the doctors with these symptoms that are abdominal and yet, youre sitting on a cancer somewhere . So, of course, these devices dont eradicate the need for a doctors diagnosis or checking whats in your food. But for some, maybe they could provide an extra layer of reassurance. That was lara. Now, i wonder whether youve seen this sort of thing going on recently. This is my face on Donald Trumps body. It was made using deepfakes an ai algorithm which is capable of taking a face from one video and animating it onto someone elses head in another video. Its fairly easy to get hold of the software, but it does require some technical know how. But recently, researchers in israel have published a paper that says faceswapping can now be done without all of the complicated training and processing. We train the different components in our algorithm on a vast number of human faces, such that it is not adjusted to a particular person but actually, adjusted to any human face. One of the main dangers of this kind of technology is that if it progresses much, much more and it will, and it will be utilised but those who are interested in undermining the Publics Trust in news, then it will be able to undermine a new domain. As the tech behind faked videos gets more sophisticated, faked speech is also becoming scarily realistic. Mouths can be animated to match words and the words can be faked, too. Now, most of the deepfakes videos are done either by cutting together genuine audio recordings of the subject or by using an impressionist, as this amazing video illustrates. Voice of Arnold Schwarzenegger dogged by his own echolalia. Voice of Morgan Freeman better to crumble into dust than wind up an impressionist. Voice of Robert De Niro the definition of cheap thrill like watching Farm Equipment rust is watching an impressionist. But weve also seen software which can listen to your voice, analyse it, then make you say things you havent. Even birds arent safe from this fakery well, in one art installation, at least. Lj rich has been to Somerset House to meet an artist who is deepfaking birdsong in a darkened room. Birds chirping. So in this room, weve real birds in one area and fake birds generated by an ai in this area. Thats a fake bird. Whispering thats a real one. Birds chirping. Listen closely, and you can hear several species like great tits, robins and chiffchaffs. Artist Alexandra Daisy ginsberg trained her ai birdsong using a generative adversarial network, or gam. This system is often used to make new video from existing video footage, commonly called deepfakes. Its not the first time she has used tech to make the impossible exist. At her studio, theres a digitally revived rhino, a computerised mars landscape as you do and even the scent of a long extinct flower. But creating deepfaked birdsong is a new challenge for the artist, both technically and ethically. So this is what we used to train the dawn chorus bits. Mm hm. Deepfakes themselves are worrying in some applications, deeply worrying. So you may have watched the Mark Zuckerberg sort of false testimony videos. All their secrets, their lives. The words look like theyre coming from his mouth, and theyre not words that he said. The system has been trained to mimic him. And in the same way in this project, were using the same technology, essentially, to mimic natural birds. Its like trying to drop a pencil on its tip and expecting it to stand up on the end of the pencil, and thats how hard it is to train one of these networks. So, how do we make a deepfake bird . Start with thousands of real sound recordings a job in itself. And thats day one. Static. Not at this point, thats not going to be a great sound installation. Next, play all of these snippets to the gam programme, which then argues with itself about whether something it makes sounds enough like, say, a robin. By day seven, we maybe have something more like this. Chirping with static. Add in generous amounts of computing time and youll get something that sounds a bit like a bird. Eventually. And then by day ten, our chorus is much more sympathetic. Various bird sounds. Its sort of an ethical issue with this project as well. Its that weve advanced the technology of deepfakes by working with them. You end up with something that is very lifelike but not real, and thats an uncomfortable thing to listen to. Now, reasonably keen ears can spot the real songbirds from the imposters. And although the end result is a technicalfeat, it also sounds a little strange. And as deepfakes continue to improve, our best defence is to educate ourselves, and each other, on how to discern whats fake and whats real whether its birds, or people. That was lj, tweeting furiously from Somerset House. And thats all we have time for this week, but if you do want to get hold of us any time during the week, dont forget, we live on social media, on facebook, youtube, instagram and twitter at bbcclick. Thanks for watching and we will see you soon. Earlier this week we saw the coldest weather of the autumn so far but since then things have been turning a little bit milder. Most places yesterday had a dry day with a little bit of sunshine coming through. We will see the temperatures continuing to rise a little bit day and night but it is turning milder because the warmer weather is more unsettled with more rain in the forecast. Most of the rain today will be near the area of low pressure that has been with us for a while, sitting to the south west. That is we will see most of the rain. Few showers coming in off the north sea threatening towards the north east of scotland and we have a few showers to come across Northern Ireland. They should fade away, getting blown away by brisk south easterly winds. A grey day for the midlands, towards the south east of england, feeling chilly in the breeze, sunshine further north but the rain will be in the south west and south wales and this is where we will find the highest temperatures, perhaps double figures. The rain can be heavy and will push its way overnight towards the south east of england, further north across wales into the midlands and a few showers in the Northern Areas as well. A lot of cloud around, ray never far away so not too cold as temperatures 3 6 degrees. Showers to come on friday. A massive sort of day. Things could develop wetter towards the south west with those showers heavy for a while merging into longer spells of rain through the south west of england. The west midlands, into the west country and wales through the day. That is an area to watch as things get wetter with temperatures typically nine, 10 degrees. Heading into the weekend and the weekend is dominated by low pressure. We have one slow moving area of low pressure over the uk which is why we see that rain develop. How far north it gets, uncertain. Could see most of the rain across england and wales perhaps heading towards Northern Ireland as far north as the central belt, allowing something a bit drier and brighter to arrive across southern parts of england and wales with temperatures again typically 9 ii degrees. Some rain around on saturday. And while that rain will peter out, as the low pressure tends to fill, we have another one coming in from the atlantic and this one looks a little deeper and it means the wind will be stronger. Again, the position could change but at the moment it looks as if while we have residual rain to clear away from scotland, the wet and windy weather should be towards the south west of england, spoiling the afternoon in wales and into the midlands but temperatures again better than they have been, typically 9 ii. This is bbc news welcome if youre watching here in the uk, on pbs in america or around the globe. Im james reynolds. Our top stories so we followed the president does make orders. President s orders. A key witness in the impeachment inquiry says donald trump wanted him to press ukraine to investigate a political rival. The president hits back. So here is my answer i want nothing. I want nothing i want no quid pro quo Queen Elizabeths son, prince andrew, steps back from public duties after controversy over his links to a convicted sex offender. Chanting. Anger in malta as protesters demand the prime ministers resignation, accusing him of protecting the killers