Uplifting the Workers, Shining a Light on the Invisible Labor Powering AI Technologies is a series of conversations to grow awareness about the human costs of AI innovation and to create a space where people in the cultural memory professions can engage in critical and caring discussions about the broader impact of AI technology. The series will feature workers’ rights activists, community organizers, AI data workers, scholars, and cultural memory practitioners. As the unrestrained development and adoption of artificial intelligence continues to impact all sectors of society, it is important for cultural memory workers to acknowledge the potential impact to our work but to also engage this new reality in critical ways that demonstrate our capacity to care for and advocate on behalf of vulnerable people. We must intentionally demonstrate our awareness of the labor exploitation, environmental harm, and other human costs underpinning AI innovation. And if cultural memory workers plan to bring AI technology into our work, we should be open to discussing how we might resist the technocapitalist agenda for AI use and be prepared to offer alternative models that are ethical, will not lead to the displacement of workers, and that will respect the rights of communities to own their cultural production.
Date/Time: Friday, April 24th, 11am-12:30pm EDT
Panelists: Joan Kinyua, Founding President of the Data Labelers Association & Ephantus Kanyugi, Data Worker and Programs Lead at the Data Labelers Association
Moderator: Dr. Meredith D. Clark
Joan Kinyua is a digital labor organizer, AI justice advocate, and founding President of the Data Labelers Association (DLA). A former data labeler with nearly a decade of experience across the AI supply chain, from chat moderation and dataset annotation to complex 3D and pixel-level labeling, she brings lived insight into the invisible human labor powering artificial intelligence. Having experienced precarious contracts, opaque performance systems, and the psychological toll of digital piecework, Joan now organizes workers, engages policymakers, and collaborates with researchers to advance ethical AI rooted in labor rights, transparency, and dignity. Through the DLA, she has championed worker-led initiatives such as a Model Contract and a Voluntary Code of Conduct to protect AI data workers.
Ephantus Kanyugi is a data worker and Programs Lead at the Data Labelers Association. Since 2018, he has worked inside the hidden human labor that teaches machines how to see, interpret, and decide, translating complex realities into structured data that powers artificial intelligence systems worldwide. His work grows from that lived experience, shaped by the discipline, emotional weight, and quiet expertise of data workers. Today, he focuses on creating space for visibility, dignity, and historical recognition for African workers whose contributions sustain the digital age yet often go unacknowledged.
Meredith D. Clark, Ph.D. (she/her), is a recovering journalist and an associate professor of race and political communication in the UNC Hussman School of Journalism and Media. Her book, “We Tried to Tell Y’all: Black Twitter and the Rise of Digital Counternarratives,” was released in 2025. She is a two-time graduate of Florida A&M University (B.A., political science, 2002; M.S., newspaper journalism, 2006) and earned her Ph.D. in mass communication from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2014. Her work has been published in prominent journals such as Social Media & Society, New Media & Society, and the International Journal of Press and Politics. She has also received research grants from organizations including the Knight Foundation, the Democracy Fund, and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Clark’s award-winning dissertation on Black Twitter landed her on The Root 100, the news website’s list of the most influential African Americans in the country, in 2015.