In factories across India, workers are strapping smartphones to their foreheads and recording every movement they make — from hand gestures to finger precision and body positioning.
It might look unusual. But for tech companies, it’s extremely valuable.
A U.S.-based company, Micro1, has recruited thousands of workers in over 70 countries to film themselves performing repetitive manual tasks. The goal: capture real human motion in detail.
Every movement becomes data. Every action helps train machines.
That footage is then licensed to companies working on humanoid robots — including Tesla, Figure AI, and Agility Robotics — all racing to develop robots capable of working in factories, warehouses, and even homes.
Micro1 alone reportedly gathers over 160,000 hours of this type of footage each month.
Workers in India earn around ₹21,000 per month for these roles — a wage considered competitive in some regions. However, reports suggest that many participants are not fully informed about where their recorded data may ultimately be used.
The demand for real-world human movement data is growing fast. Companies are investing heavily, with the robotics industry spending tens of millions of dollars annually to collect and refine this kind of training material.
Another major player, Scale AI, has already gathered over 100,000 hours of similar footage — and insiders say the total data needed could reach into the billions of hours.
As automation accelerates, questions are starting to surface:
Who benefits the most from this data?
And what role will human workers have once machines can replicate what they’ve learned?