Good morning, Quartz readers!
Imagine a world in which a ruthless algorithm decides how long it should take you, to the second, to finish an assignment, docking your pay if you fail to meet the deadline. That’s the reality for China’s millions of food delivery workers.
The rivalry between Meituan, now China’s third most valuable listed tech company, and Ele.me, has meant ever cheaper and faster deliveries of takeaway, groceries, medicines—and even running of general errands. It’s also been a proxy war for social media giant Tencent, which backs Meituan, and e-commerce monolith Alibaba, which acquired Ele.me two years ago. But for workers, the unstoppable demand has meant risking their lives to meet unreasonable deadlines the apps set for them. Bad reviews for late delivery can mean lost pay, or being dropped entirely.
Discussion of their plight flares up on China’s internet frequently, especially as the riders became a lifeline for so many during the pandemic. This week, a harsher than usual outcry made waves thanks to an article from Ren Wu, or People, a respected Chinese lifestyle magazine under a state-owned publisher. Reported over months, the piece detailed exactly how the riders have been squeezed—last year many saw minutes subtracted from the time allotted for their routes, likely because of algorithm changes. In one case a 50 minute route was reduced to 35 minutes. Traffic injury data compiled from cities around the country shows the toll.
This isn’t just a China problem of course—the comfort delivered to white-collar workers globally during the pandemic has contrasted starkly with the deliverers’ lack of health insurance, paid sick days, and even basic protective gear. Companies aren’t inclined to lead on this issue, and governments are only just starting to pay attention. In California, a new gig-worker law requires companies like Uber and Lyft to treat their workers as employees, but the ride-hailing giants are working hard to carve out exemptions. France is asking experts for advice on improving gig worker conditions, which could shape EU rules.
It’s unclear when these efforts will yield real results. After the People story, Meituan said it’s giving drivers an extra eight minutes for each order, while Ele.me is allowing users to select the option of waiting an extra five to 10 minutes (link in Chinese). But those concessions are only drops in a bucket when what’s needed is real, systemic change. —Jane Li
The pandemic has introduced a golden age for delivery services—but also laid bare some very real problems in the industry. Read more in our field guide on the Delivery Dilemma.
Five things on Quartz we especially liked
An exchange you can believe in? This week’s launch of the Long-Term Stock Exchange (LTSE) initially reminded me of the ill-fated IEX exchange, created by the star of Michael Lewis’s book Flash Boys and designed to level the playing field against high-frequency traders. Why might LTSE succeed where IEX failed? You’ll have to read John Detrixhe’s interview with its creator (who also wrote The Lean Startup), Eric Ries, to find out. —Max Lockie deputy news editor
Lost in adaptation. When I read that Game of Thrones alums would be creating a series based on Cixin Liu’s The Three-Body Problem, my excitement was quickly followed by apprehension that this complex story would be ruined. Turns out I wasn’t the only one. Jane Li masterfully breaks down all the ways Chinese fans fear the series won’t stack up to the bestselling book—and how the rivalry between the US and China might play a part. —Alex Ossola, special projects editor
Surviving Covid-19, and doing it well. Kenya has been spared the dire death rates that many other countries experienced in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic—but scientists aren’t sure why. I was fascinated by Olivia Goldhill’s look at a few possible explanations, ranging from the youthfulness of its population to the potential protective effect of HIV medication. —Sarah Todd, reporter, Quartz at Work
When smoke gets in your eyes (and lungs). The very fact that Michael J. Coren wrote a helpful lung protection guide for those living in the new US Smoke Belt indicates a changing world. People who live in pollution-riddled areas like Delhi are already used to checking air quality on a daily basis, and now the west coast wildfires are introducing many Americans to the concept that consistently bad air is a life-threatening concern. —Susan Howson, news editor
It’s never too late. Come for the story of the investment banker who, in his 40s, applied for his childhood dream job—NASA astronaut—with surprising success; stay for Sarah Todd’s insightful exploration of what we regret, what it says about us, and how it can propel us toward further adventures. And why, like most uncomfortable things in life, regret is an inevitable, and ultimately enriching side effect of being human. —Annalisa Merelli, geopolitics reporter
A brief history of sports branding
As a strange football season kicks off in the US—with one team yet to decide on a new name—the Quartz Weekly Obsession took a look at the colors, icons, names, mascots, and songs that create a team’s particular aura (and allows it to sell a whole lot of merchandise).
Some key dates:
1875: In a vote, Harvard students, faculty, and alumni choose crimson over magenta as the school’s color.
1880s: US colleges begin using nicknames for their teams, ushering in an era of Hokies, Wahoos, and Hoyas.
1946: The Lanham Act, also known as the trademark act, becomes law, and a whole world of exclusive merchandising becomes possible.
1992: A rally in Washington, DC demands the National Football League team’s name change.
2013: Washington’s owner Dan Snyder says the name will never change: “NEVER—you can use caps,” he said, so we just did.
2018: The Cleveland Indians remove Chief Wahoo, a racist caricature of a Native American, from their uniforms.
July 2020: Stadium sponsor FedEx formally asks the Washington Football Team to rename itself, as Nike removes the team’s gear from its online shop. Within a day, the team announces the name is under review and will change accordingly.
September 2020: The National Collegiate Athletic Association applied to add “Battle in the Bubble” to their roster of trademarks, which include “March Madness” and “Final Four.
Read more about the ways teams create and sell identities in the Quartz Weekly Obsession on sports branding. Want to see our newest Obsessions as soon as they’re published? Sign up below.
An open book
For nearly three decades, Laura Day has made a career of letting corporate clients tap her intuition, and writing bestselling books about how everyday people can do the same thing for themselves. In semi-retirement at 61, she now has just four companies on retainer, who can call her at will with specific questions to see if she can intuit a path forward.
“Usually it’s, ‘Can I hit you?’ and I’ll say, ‘Yeah hit me,’” she says of the process. “And they’ll say, ‘Will this actor take $14 million?’” That’s a specific enough question for Day to work with, but if the question is more vague, she says, such as “What do you think of this company?” she has to rework it to form what she calls a target.
The concept of relying on intuition and gut feelings has attracted countless philosophers, scientists, researchers, and consumers who want to understand how to use it more effectively. They don’t agree on everything, but they do offer some valuable insight for those of us hoping to tap into our own. Read more in our field guide to decision making.
✦ “Will a Quartz membership bring you a paywall-free experience along with many field guides like this one and the satisfaction of supporting the work we do?” Our gut feeling says yes. Try it out today.
Five things from elsewhere that made us smarter
Becoming a tool of Chinese propaganda. Many women experience abuse on social media, but few on the level that New Yorker writer Jiayang Fang has. In a deeply personal essay, Fang, who moved to the US from China with her parents at a young age, details how she faced death threats and labels of “race traitor”—all the while she cared for her ALS-stricken mother in a New York hospital through the pandemic. —Isabella Steger, Asia deputy editor
The judiciary is collapsing. From Poland and Hungary to Turkey and India, the rising power of right-wing leaders is stifling the independence of the courts. Left with little time to question the government, courts are being packed with “favorable” benches. And in the past six years, as Prof Madhav Khosla, writing for The New York Times, argues, nowhere has this collapse been more severe as it has been in India. —Manavi Kapur, reporter, Quartz India
One word: plastic. In the 1980s, disposable products were piling up, and the public was tired of it. The solution? Oil and gas companies spent millions on publicity campaigns promoting recycling plastic—even though they knew most would never go anywhere but a landfill. This joint investigation by NPR and PBS shows exactly how the industry exploited good intentions to hoodwink the public into believing their multibillion-dollar industry wasn’t an environmental disaster. —Tim Fernholz, senior reporter
Change from within. Normally, an average stay for an asylum-seeker held by US immigration at Louisiana’s Pine Prairie detention center would be 45 days. But the detentions of many African migrants seeking refugee status now range from 11 months to two years. That stark upturn led to several protests and hunger strikes to raise awareness of human rights abuses, writes Joe Penney for the New York Review of Books. —Yinka Adegoke, editor, Quartz Africa
The most vulnerable people on school campuses. While most coverage focuses on the health of students and teachers returning to schools during the pandemic, Giulia Heyward highlights for The Atlantic how cafeteria staff continue to work in cramped quarters without healthcare and few labor protections on campuses across the US. —Nicolás Rivero, tech reporter
Our best wishes for a relaxing but thought-filled weekend. Please send any news, comments, dream job stories, and examples of cinematic adaptations that are better than the books to hi@qz.com. Get the most out of Quartz by downloading our app and becoming a member. Today’s Weekend Brief was brought to you by Jane Li, Max Lockie, and Susan Howson.