Don’t send a human to do a machine’s job

Uber has begun keeping an eye on its drivers through sensors in their smartphones that monitor speed, location, and other factors.

A post on the company’s blog partially published by The Guardian, TechCrunch and Fast Company says Uber is able to check information on the smartphones of drivers who have been the object of complaints by passengers. The idea, says the company, is to establish objectively the circumstances of a customer complaint, which it points out are often the result of subjective factors and perceptions about traffic, routes, or maneuvering, as well as something as basic as a lack of empathy between passenger and driver.

It is relatively easy for Uber to gather information on its drivers, who are all issued with the same model of smartphone, allowing the company to build up a profile of each driver, for example the speed his or her car is travelling, breaking patterns, or acceleration on bends.

Uber can also monitor how drivers use their smartphones, and whether, for example, they are stored on their dashboard mount while the vehicle is in motion and not used for other activities. Although the company will still hear both sides of the story when investigating complaints, it is clear that simply looking at the data about a car’s speed, movements, maneuvers, etc, is a much quicker and effective way of getting to the truth.

For many years now, my wife does the driving when we’re together. I have grown used to her manner of handling the car, while she constantly criticizes what she sees as my less-than-smooth style, something I tend to deny. I can see that I’ll have to consult Uber about its use of sensors to bring an end to this dispute :-)

Uber’s initiative reminds me of those stickers you used to see on the back of trucks in some countries saying something like “How’s my driving?” accompanied by a telephone number that other road users can call to complain. But in a world in which we all have a small computer on us at all times awash with sensors, we no longer need human mediation.

Tech companies like Amazon and Uber are increasingly resorting to data analysis when it comes to making decisions, including those that directly involve humans. The days of gut feeling are over: now it’s simply a question of examining the results of an A/B test or some other kind of objective evaluation.

We have now reached the point where we no longer have to make a decision based on the testimony of drivers: it makes no difference is somebody insists they were in the correct lane, had signaled, and were travelling at the speed limit. A quick check of the data on their smartphone will settle the matter. In the end, machines are almost always more trustworthy than humans.

(En español, aquí)