Read This: Inside the poo-festooned human labor that keeps Waymo rolling

After July 4 gridlock in San Francisco drained several Waymo batteries and left its cars powerless in traffic, the clearly frustrated Bay Area Current published a spicy interview with one such contractor, dubbed “Robotaxi Handler” (to protect their identity), who describes the working conditions required to keep Waymo running. Note: The operative term they use here is “massive fuckstorm,” which is certainly in keeping with the company’s various dubious policies detailed in the article, including an international string of remote assistants for whenever a Waymo’s computers go kablooey.

In Stephanie Reist’s article “Cleaning Up Poop: The Human Labor Behind Waymo,” “Robotaxi Handler” unpacks the doo-ties involved in their many roles at one of Waymo’s San Francisco depots (managed by the workforce contractor Transdev), which extend somewhat beyond those of mortal taxi varieties. They detail Waymo’s dubious hiring practices (“They said, ‘You’re hired.’ And I’m like, ‘I didn’t even get an interview'”), the funneling of data after every ride (“We take that data and put it into a little offload storage place”), and, most odiously, cleaning the human (and animal) waste left behind on some rides.

For more on Waymo’s alleged work demands, a discussion of a Waymo “soul,” and what some folks are willing to put up with for $29 an hour (“We’re hired for our capacity to do labor and not for our labor itself,” Robotaxi says), we suggest you read the full interview at this link. Maybe not over lunch; just… take our word on that.