A demo from Optifye.ai, a member of Y Combinator’s present cohort, sparked a social media backlash that ended up with YC deleting it off its socials.
Optifye says it’s constructing software program to assist manufacturing facility homeowners know who’s working — and who isn’t — in “real-time” because of AI-powered safety cameras it locations on meeting traces, in response to its YC profile.
On Monday, YC posted an Optifye demo video on X (and on LinkedIn), in response to a snapshot saved by TechCrunch.
The video reveals Optifye co-founder Kushal Mohta performing because the boss of a garment manufacturing facility, calling a supervisor — in actuality his co-founder Vivaan Baid — a couple of low-performing employee recognized solely as “Number 17.”
“Hey Number 17, what’s going on man? You’re in the red,” Baid asks the employee, who responds that he’s been working all day.
“Working all day? You haven’t hit your hourly output even once and you had 11.4% efficiency. This is really bad,” Baid retorts.
After checking Optifye’s dashboard, the supervisor seems on the output of “Number 17” for 15 days, decides that the employee has been underperforming and calls the employee out on it.
“Rough day? More like a rough month,” he says.
The clip was closely criticized on X, the place @VCBrags known as it “sweatshops-as-a-service” and one other deemed it “computer vision sweatshop software.” It additionally sparked criticism on Y Combinator’s personal hyperlink sharing web site Hacker Information.
Not everybody was crucial, although. Eoghan McCabe, the CEO of buyer help startup Intercom, posted that anybody complaining higher cease shopping for merchandise made in China and India.
Certainly, it’s not too troublesome to seek out tech corporations in China touting a “sleep detection” digicam that makes use of pc imaginative and prescient to identify sleeping employees, for instance.
Both approach, YC ended up deleting the demo video from its socials, however not earlier than it was saved by a number of accounts.
Neither YC nor Optifye.ai responded to a request for remark.
The video’s possible unintended virality showcases rising anxieties over the rise of AI, particularly within the office.
Most Individuals oppose utilizing AI to trace employees’ desk time, actions, and pc use, a Pew ballot present in 2023. This can be a phase of surveillance merchandise typically known as “bossware.”
That hasn’t stopped VCs from funding the area, although. Invisible AI, for instance, raised $15 million in 2022 to stay worker-monitoring cameras in factories, too.
