Friday, June 16, 2017

Is Data All that Great.. an intro



It is important to challenge data and not just accept facts. If we never questioned anything then we would let errors go unnoticed.  Just like fake news we cannot just accept everything we see at surface level without digger deeper. By no means am I saying lets ignore data, it provides way too many valuable insights. The pros of big data are way larger than the possible bad data we might run into. So from here lets dig deeper into big data, and where it could go wrong.

First off it seems that data has become so pervasive in our lives, we hardly even notice it until it affects us directly. One application that has become particularly common is the use of algorithms to evaluate job performance.

"For example, she tells the story of Sarah Wysocki, a teacher who, despite being widely respected by her students, their parents and her peers, was fired because she performed poorly according to an algorithm." When an algorithm rates you poorly, you are immediately branded as an underperformer and there is rarely an opportunity to appeal those judgments. Along with that seldom find out how they were concluded. In many cases, methods are considered "proprietary" and no details are shared. Numbers are numbers of course so its hard to question it or say they are wrong.

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