REINVENTING SOCIETY IN THE WAKE OF BIG DATA

What those breadcrumbs tell is the story of your life. It tells what you've chosen to do. That's very different than what you put on Facebook. What you put on Facebook is what you would like to tell people, edited according to the standards of the day. Who you actually are is determined by where you spend time, and which things you buy. Big data is increasingly about real behavior, and by analyzing this sort of data, scientists can tell an enormous amount about you. They can do this because the sort of person you are is largely determined by your social context, so if I can see some of your behaviors, I can infer the rest, just by comparing you to the people in your crowd. As a consequence analysis of Big Data is increasingly about finding connections, connections with the people around you, and connections between people's behavior and outcomes. Understanding these human-machine systems is what's going to make our future social systems stable and safe. Creating A Data-Driven Society

Big Data and Design Thinking | Nextsensing.com Big data analytics is big now in the digital world. Take a moment to think about all the data being collected somewhere every minute about people’s transactions, purchases, complaints, bookings, cancellations, preferences and requests. The chance to harness all this information to “make sense of things” is an opportunity too promising to ignore. This explains why data mining and analytics gurus (the whole big data industry) are in high demand. But it’s important to note that data, alone, skews toward the quantitative; and what that data “means” and/or what it predicts is heavily dependent on human insight. It’s critical to note, however, that a large measure of “beyond the numbers” insight is required to move beyond bits and bytes to understand the deeply human dimensions of emerging behaviours. Collecting data is a science; adding insight is more of an art. First, you need reliability. The story of how Fedex came to be and the trials of its founder, Frederick Smith, is captured here.

The Power of Big Data/Big Design A primer on emerging advancements in technology. Power is a funny thing. You can’t see it, but its effects are palpable. It doesn’t weigh anything, but it can be heavy-handed. In the age of the internet, information is power. Ironically, this vastly increased ability to create and store information has made it harder than ever to wield power. This new “ecosystem” of big data has had a profound effect on how we make, buy, and consume all manner of things. The promise of big data creates a whole new opportunity for design firms. This is a profound shift. And that’s just the beginning. By the end of lunch, you will have accomplished the equivalent of a month’s worth of work. Now comes the hard part. Design thinking has a big role to play in all this. Now let’s take this one step further and apply big data/big design to buildings after they are constructed. The phenomenon of using technology to shape our environment is not new.

Using Big Data to Drive Innovation The Huffington Post 2 mentions — 5 days ago A picture taken on October 9, 2008 shows an ultralight helicopter hovering above a field where Greenpeace activists and Austrian organic farming association BIO AUSTRIA wrote the message 'NO GMO' (Genetically Modified Organism) by planting light green coloured organic buckwheat in a field of organic peas in Breitenfurt, NPR.org 7 mentions — 4 days ago Backers of the new Open Source Seed Initiative will pass out 29 new varieties of 14 different crops, including broccoli, carrots and kale, on Thursday.Backers of the new Open Source Seed Initiative will pass out 29 new varieties of 14 different crops, including broccoli, carrots and kale, on ... 2 mentions — 6 days ago David Suzuki Foundation 3 mentions — 4 days ago In railing against everything from bike lanes to transit spending, pundits and politicians often raise the spectre of a "war on cars." MIT Technology Review Co.Exist 4 mentions — 4 days ago KurzweilAI 3 mentions — 5 days ago Brain Pickings Edudemic