FIELD GUIDE · WORK, MANAGEMENT & THE ALGORITHM
Software already schedules you, watches you, scores you, ranks you. Firing is where the dashboard meets the door.
UPDATED 2026-10-12
TL;DR
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A 2025 OECD employer survey across six countries found software that instructs, monitors, or evaluates workers is widespread, with especially high adoption in the United States. This isn't a future-of-work scenario. It's Tuesday.
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In the OECD survey, nearly two-thirds of managers using algorithmic management reported concerns about worker impacts. Leading worries: nobody's accountable, and nobody can follow the machine's logic. Even the people deploying the tools think the governance is sketchy.
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Twenty-six former Meta employees alleged AI-powered systems disproportionately targeted workers with disabilities or medical leave in a mass layoff. Meta disputed the claims and said humans made the decisions. The merits remain contested. One courtroom, the whole fight: when is an AI-influenced firing actually a human decision?
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Workers in Mobley v. Workday allege AI-based screening produced discriminatory rejections. Workday denies wrongdoing, and the litigation is testing how liability should be split between software vendors and employers. Automated employment decisions don't get to skip discrimination law.
💸 The guide’s stakeholder ledger, drawn as a money map.
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NEXT FIELD GUIDE →SHOULD YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO TALK TO A HUMAN?The chatbot can reset a password. The argument starts when it becomes the only door between a person and their bank, utility, insurer, landlord, hospital, or government.A billionaire who builds surveillance software fears a world government promising protection. Douthat pressed him in 2025. Then came the secret lectures, the pope, the AI safetyists — and an Iran-war break with Trump.
Peter Thiel made his fortune on the internet and keeps insisting the internet was not enough. Flying cars, Mars, AI, longevity and the meaning of progress — the other half of his worldview.
Washington is trying to choke off China's AI — chip bans, blacklists, and now Taiwan making smuggling a crime. Beijing just returned the favor, locking down its own AI exports. Meanwhile the models keep getting cheaper, better, and closer together. A field guide to the argument over whether the race protects anyone, or just speeds everything up.
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The lawsuit claims are contested. The management software is not imaginary.