The Indian workers training AI robots to do their jobs

WITH a smartphone strapped to her head, Indian housewife Nagireddy Sriramyachandra films herself slicing mangoes to train AI-powered robots to take on household jobs in the future.

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Earning just over two dollars for an hour of video, her mundane recordings are invaluable for global tech companies teaching machines how to move like humans in the real world.

The 25-year-old is one of a growing army of thousands of AI system trainers in the world’s most populous country.

“Who else will give you 250 rupees (about R43) an hour just for doing housework?” said Sriramyachandra from her kitchen in Chennai in southern India’s Tamil Nadu state.

“I may get a robot myself in the future,” she added. Artificial intelligence chatbots and image generators crunch reams of digital data, but building systems to navigate real-life environments is more challenging.

Developers think feeding first-person footage, called “egocentric data”, into specialised AI models will help robots copy humans. Some AI trainers work at home, others in factories or specialised studios - using video glasses, head-mounted cameras and motion sensors.

“It blares ‘hands not detected’ when I’m not recording properly,” said Sriramyachandra, who sends recordings via a special app to the AI data company Objectways.