[Media] Antonio Casilli for BloomBerg : data work platforms experts are just the “Cherry on top”

On October 16, Bloomberg published an article about highly paid experts entering the data work industry.

Until recently, data work platforms were known for offering low wages and requiring little formal qualification. However, we have recently seen data work companies offering much higher rates, sometimes reaching $400 an hour for professionals in specialised fields such as radiography, software engineering, and civil rights law.

Antonio Casilli, co-founder of DiPLab, explains that these so-called “expert” data annotators are, in fact, only assigned a very small portion of the tasks available on these platforms. DiPLab’s recent report, Surveillance at Scale, already addresses this issue, showing how these experts are given only a limited number of tasks before being sidelined by the platform.

Advertising recruitment campaigns targeting highly qualified professionals could benefit AI companies by creating the impression among the general public that their products are trained by PhD-level experts, while the vast majority of the work continues to be performed by precarious, underpaid workers.

Mercor, one of these companies, claims to pay its workers an average of $110 an hour. Prolific, meanwhile, claims that 30% of its workforce consists of experts. Both companies have declined to provide further details to substantiate these claims.

Read the article here (subscription based)

Illustration: By Planetary AI and Techworker
Community Africa
DOI: https://doi.org/10.7488/era/7341
©2026 Njung’e Wanjiru, Mohammad
Amir Anwar, Beatrice Bonami, Srravya
Chandhiramowuli, Richard Mathenge,
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Illustrator: Njung’e Wanjiru