Crowdsourcing Tolstoy

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

 at the NewYorker: “When Leo Tolstoy’s great-great-granddaughter, the journalist Fyokla Tolstaya, announced that the Leo Tolstoy State Museum was looking for volunteers to proofread some forty-six thousand eight hundred pages of her relative’s writings, she hoped to generate enough interest to get the first round of corrections done in six months.

Within days, some three thousand Russians—engineers, I.T. workers, schoolteachers, retirees, a student pilot, a twenty-year-old waitress—signed on. “We were so happy and so surprised,” said Tolstaya. “They finished in fourteen days.”

Now, thanks largely to the efforts of these volunteers, nearly all of the great Russian writer’s massive body of work, including novels, diaries, letters, religious tracts, philosophical treatises, travelogues, and childhood memories, will soon be available online, in a form that can be easily downloaded, free of charge. “Of course we realized there are some novels on the Internet,” Tolstaya said. “But most [writings] are not. We in the museum decided this is not good.”…

The definitive, ninety-volume jubilee edition of Tolstoy’s works, compiled and published in Russia from the nineteen-twenties to the nineteen-fifties, had already been scanned by the Russian State Library. However, converting the PDFs into an easy-to-use digital format posed a challenge. For one thing, even after ABBYY, a company that specializes in translating printed documents into digital records, offered their services for free, proofreading costs were likely to be prohibitive. Charging readers to download the works was not an option. “At the end of his life, Tolstoy said, ‘I don’t need any money for my work. I want to give my work to the people,’ “ said Tolstaya. “It was important for us to make it free for everyone. It is his will.”

That was when they hit on the idea of crowdsourcing, Tolstaya said. “It’s according to Leo Tolstoy’s ideas, to do it with the help of all people around the world—vsem mirom—even the world’s hardest task can be done with the help of everyone.”…(More)”

Data governance: a Royal Society and British Academy project

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Call for Evidence from The British Academy and the Royal Society: “…The project seeks to make recommendations for cross-sectoral governance arrangements that can ensure the UK remains a world leader in this area. The project will draw on scholars and scientists from across disciplines and will look at current and historical case studies of data governance, and of broader technology governance, from a range of countries and sectors. It will seek to enable connected debate by creating common frameworks to move debates on data governance forward.

Background

It is essential to get the best possible environment for the safe and rapid use of data in order to enhance UK’s wellbeing, security and economic growth. The UK has world class academic expertise in data science, in ethics and aspects other of governance; and it has a rapidly growing tech sector and there is a real opportunity for the UK to lead internationally in creating insights and mechanisms for enabling the new data sciences to benefit society.

While there are substantial arrangements in place for the safe use of data in the UK, these inevitably were designed early in the days of information technology and tend to rest on outdated notions of privacy and consent. In addition, newer considerations such as statistical stereotyping and bias in datasets, and implications for the freedom of choice, autonomy and equality of opportunity of individuals, come to the fore in this new technological context, as do transparency, accountability and openness of decision making.

Terms of Reference

The project seeks to:

  • Identify the communities with interests in the governance of data and its uses, but which may be considering these issues in different contexts and with varied aims and assumptions, in order to facilitate dialogue between these communities. These include academia, industry and the public sector.
  • Clarify where there are connections between different debates, identifying shared issues and common questions, and help to develop a common framework and shared language for debate.
  • Identify which social, ethical and governance challenges arise in the context of developments in data use.
  • Set out the public interests at stake in governance of data and its uses, and the relationships between them, and how the principles of responsible research and innovation (RRI) apply in the context of data use.
  • Make proposals for the UK to establish a sustained and flexible platform for debating issues of data governance, developing consensus about future legal and technical frameworks, and ensuring that learning and good practice spreads as fast as possible….(More)”

Innovations in Open Grantmaking

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

New Report by Andrew Young, Andrew Miller and Beth Simone Noveck at GrantCraft: “Of its $4.1 trillion fiscal year 2016 budget, the U.S. federal government and its grantmaking agencies will give out billions of dollars in the form of grants to states, localities, and individuals, supporting a dizzying array of activities, from scientific research and economic development to arts, culture, and education.

Grantmaking, in short, plays a vital role in helping our government, our researchers, and our communities confront 21st-century challenges. Despite grantmaking’s importance, we have a decidedly 20th-century system in place for deciding how we make these billions of dollars of crucial public investments. To make the most of limited funding—and help build confidence in the ability of public investments to make a positive difference—it is essential for our government agencies to try more innovative approaches to designing, awarding, and measuring their grantmaking activities.

Innovations in Open Grantmaking seeks to provide inspiration and early proof of concept regarding innovative practices at every stage of the grantmaking process. The examples and lessons included can act as suggested guidelines for future research and experimentation around more openly and effectively providing access to public money…(More)”

Facebook, World Bank and OECD Link Up to Gather Data

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Paul Hannon in the Wall Street Journal: “Social media potentially offers cheaper and more timely way to survey firms and gauge the economy…Facebook has teamed up with the World Bank and the OECD to launch a new measure of business sentiment based on questioning companies that use their Facebook pages to connect with customers.

The three partners on Wednesday launched a new measure of business sentiment based on questioning companies that use their Facebook pages to connect with customers. Known as the Future of Business Survey, the report has been in testing since February and received responses to 15 queries from a total of 90,000 small and midsize firms across 22 countries.

Its first public release shows that those businesses are more optimistic about their prospects than other companies surveyed by more traditional means.

But the real interest for the three partners is the potential to drill down into the factors that affect the growth of small businesses, a process that until now has involved great expense and time, since it involves face-to-face interviews by polling professionals that are carried out over many months and are infrequently updated. “What I feel is appealing about this particular survey is that it’s potentially a more powerful tool for getting information more quickly and at a fraction of the cost,” said Augusto Lopez-Claros, director of the Global Indicators Group at the World Bank.

Even in developed countries with well funded and equipped statistics offices, timely information on very small businesses is hard to come by. In developing countries, that scarcity can be more acute. The ability to connect with business owners via Facebook or other social-media platforms could make it possible to gather such information, and acquire a more complete picture of what is happening in those economies.

The new approach to data gathering could even enable some smaller developing countries to skip the process of enlarging their statistics agencies. That is an opportunity Mr. Lopez Claros compares to the advent of mobile telephones, which enabled many African countries to skip the construction of expensive fixed-line infrastructure and improve communications at a fraction of that cost….(More)

See also Entrepreneurship at a Glance 2016 (OECD).

Privacy and Open Data

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

A Research Briefing by Wood, Alexandra and O’Brien, David and Gasser, Urs: “Political leaders and civic advocates are increasingly recommending that open access be the “default state” for much of the information held by government agencies. Over the past several years, they have driven the launch of open data initiatives across hundreds of national, state, and local governments. These initiatives are founded on a presumption of openness for government data and have led to the public release of large quantities data through a variety of channels. At the same time, much of the data that have been released, or are being considered for release, pertain to the behavior and characteristics of individual citizens, highlighting tensions between open data and privacy. This research briefing offers a snapshot of recent developments in the open data and privacy landscape, outlines an action map of various governance approaches to protecting privacy when releasing open data, and identifies key opportunities for decision-makers seeking to respond to challenges in this space….(More)”

The Wealth of Humans: Work, Power, and Status in the Twenty-first Century

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Book by Ryan Avent: “None of us has ever lived through a genuine industrial revolution. Until now.

Digital technology is transforming every corner of the economy, fundamentally altering the way things are done, who does them, and what they earn for their efforts. In The Wealth of Humans, Economist editor Ryan Avent brings up-to-the-minute research and reporting to bear on the major economic question of our time: can the modern world manage technological changes every bit as disruptive as those that shook the socioeconomic landscape of the 19th century?

Traveling from Shenzhen, to Gothenburg, to Mumbai, to Silicon Valley, Avent investigates the meaning of work in the twenty-first century: how technology is upending time-tested business models and thrusting workers of all kinds into a world wholly unlike that of a generation ago. It’s a world in which the relationships between capital and labor and between rich and poor have been overturned.

Past revolutions required rewriting the social contract: this one is unlikely to demand anything less. Avent looks to the history of the Industrial Revolution and the work of numerous experts for lessons in reordering society. The future needn’t be bleak, but as The Wealth of Humans explains, we can’t expect to restructure the world without a wrenching rethinking of what an economy should be….(More)”

Measuring Scientific Impact Beyond Citation Counts

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Robert M. Patton, Christopher G. Stahl and Jack C. Wells at DLib Magazine: “Measuring scientific progress remains elusive. There is an intuitive understanding that, in general, science is progressing forward. New ideas and theories are formed, older ideas and theories are confirmed, rejected, or modified. Progress is made. But, questions such as how is it made, by whom, how broadly, or how quickly present significant challenges. Historically, scientific publications reference other publications if the former publication in some way shaped the work that was performed. In other words, one publication “impacted” a latter one. The implication of this impact revolves around the intellectual content of the idea, theory, or conclusion that was formed. Several metrics such as h-index or journal impact factor (JIF) are often used as a means to assess whether an author, article, or journal creates an “impact” on science. The implied statement behind high values for such metrics is that the work must somehow be valuable to the community, which in turn implies that the author, article, or journal somehow has influenced the direction, development, or progress of what others in that field do. Unfortunately, the drive for increased publication revenue, research funding, or global recognition has lead to a variety of external factors completely unrelated to the quality of the work that can be used to manipulate key metric values. In addition, advancements in computing and data sciences field have further altered the meaning of impact on science.

The remainder of this paper will highlight recent advancements in both cultural and technological factors that now influence scientific impact as well as suggest new factors to be leveraged through full content analysis of publications….(More)”

Ethics in data project design: It’s about planning

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Anna Lauren Hoffmann at O’Reilly: “When I explain the value of ethics to students and professionals alike, I refer it as an “orientation.” As any good designer, scientist, or researcher knows, how you orient yourself toward a problem can have a big impact on the sort of solution you develop—and how you get there. As Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, “perception is not whimsical, but fatal.” Your particular perspective, knowledge of, and approach to a problem shapes your solution, opening up certain paths forward and forestalling others.

Data-driven approaches to business help optimize measurable outcomes—but the early planning of a project needs to account for the ethical (and in many cases, the literal) landscape to avoid ethically treacherous territory. Several recent cases in the news illustrate this point and show the type of preparation that enables a way to move forward in both a data-driven and ethical fashion: Princeton Review’s ZIP-code-based pricing scheme, which turned out to unfairly target Asian-American families, and Amazon’s same-day-delivery areas, which neglect majority-Black neighborhoods.

You can approach a new project using a road trip analogy. The destination is straightforward—profit, revenue, or another measurable KPI. But the path you take to get there will need to be determined. If my wife and I, for example, want to drive from our apartment in Oakland (Point A) to visit my wife’s sister in Los Angeles (Point B), we have to figure out how we’d like to approach the trip. If we’re concerned primarily with efficiency, certain questions immediately come to the fore, namely: what’s the fastest route to LA? Determining the fastest route requires us to pay attention to certain features of the possible trip, such as traffic speeds, easily accessible gas stations, and traffic conditions.On the other hand, if my wife and I are interested in taking the most scenic route from Oakland to LA, a whole different set of concerns become salient. Gas stations are likely still relevant, but speed is less of a factor. We’ll also want to take into account things like notable landmarks and towns (and my tendency toward car sickness) along the way.

The destination is the same; the laws we have to abide by are the same, but how we get from Point A to Point B, then, is heavily determined by how we orient ourselves toward the trip in the first place.

The same goes for research or design projects: how you orient yourself or your team toward solving certain problems or achieving certain goals will fundamentally shape the journey you take. If you’re interested in reaching a goal as quickly as possible—if your only concern is speed or turnaround time—a particular set of concerns are going to be salient. But if you’re interested in reaching a goal not only efficiently but ethically, then a different set of concerns will pop up….(More)”

Next big thing: The ‘uberfication’ of crowdsourced news

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Ken Doctor at Politico: “Get ready to hear a lot about the “uberfication” of user-generated content.

Yes, it’s a mouthful. But it’s also the next big thing. Fresco News, a two-year-old New York start-up, sees itself becoming a hot property as it cracks the code on local amateur content generation….Fresco News now enables local TV stations to assign, receive and quickly get on air and online lots of amateur-shot newsy videos in their metro area.

Its secret sauce: Uberizing the supply chain process from station assignment to Fresco “qualified” shooter to shooting smartphone video to uploading and optimizing its quality for quick delivery to consumers, online or on the air.

Meyer’s team of 40, which includes numerous part-timers, has assiduously worked through the many frictions. That’s one hallmark of successful Uberfication.

“We just did a tremendous amount of just non-stop testing,” he says. “I would say, even with simple things like user acquisition, which is a major part of our process and entering new markets. We’ve tested hundreds of different ad types, graphics that we’ve designed internally that effectively, and I would say cheaply, bring in prospective citizen journalists.”

Stations can assign easily. Would-be shooters can see assignments, geographically displayed, on a single screen. The upload works well and stations’ ability to quickly use the videos is a strong selling point. Fresco, then, handles the billing and payment processes, much as Uber does.

As with once-taxi rides, individual transaction amounts compute small. Shooters get $50 for each video used by a TV station or $20 for a still photo. Stations pay $75 for a video and $30 for a still. As a standalone business, Fresco News is a scale play.

It’s not a new idea.

UGC – or user-generated content – was supposed to be huge. The late ’90s notion: the Internet could make anyone and everyone a reporter, and make it easy for them to share their work widely and cheaply. Many newspaper chains bought into the idea, and tested it unevenly, hoping that UGC could provide what was, for awhile called, “local-local” content. Local-local meaning neighborhood plus, that kind of locally differentiating news coverage that publishers thought readers wanted, but coverage publishers believed cost too much if they had to pay professional reporters to do it.

Short story: It didn’t work for the chains. In part, the technology was immature. More importantly, it turns out that reporting – and writing – remains, even the Internet age, largely a professional skill. Publishers couldn’t find enough dependable local amateurs, and besides, they never really iterated a business model around the idea.

Then, there were the national start-up efforts. NowPublic, one memorable one partnered with the Associated Press, launched in 2005 …but never found traction. Today, several other companies ply the territory, with Storyful a standard of quality. Importantly, Storyful focuses on national and global content. Fresco News aims squarely at local – first across the 3,000-mile breadth of the U.S.

The dots tell the story

Take a look at the many dots on the Philly map above. Each blue dot represents an active, signed-up Fresco video shooter in the area. Each yellow dot shows current assignments. In this August visualization, visually, you get a sense of quickly and energetically local TV station Fox 29, WTXF, has deployed – and uses – Fresco News.as earned “preferred” status at Fresco, has been around journalistic operations for a long time and looks forward to contributing news tips as Fresco might expand what its tech can do for local stations…(More)”

App gamifies safe street design, gets kids involved

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Springwise: “It’s unlikely that cars will ever completely disappear, so cities are finding ways to help two wheels and four wheels safely co-exist. In-ground LED lights warn cars when a cyclist is approaching, and this app provides a driver’s safety performance report after each journey. In Norway, as part of a project to get more citizens walking and cycling, Oslo’s Traffic Agent app gives young school children a way to report street safety.

Initially focusing on home-to-school routes, the app assigns each child an agent number. The agents then log safe or unsafe conditions they come across in their travel to school. The app was developed by the Agency of Urban Environment, the Norwegian Centre for Transport Research and the Oslo City Teaching Agency, in consultation with children. And the Traffic Agent team is working closely with parent-teacher associations to get as many schools and children as possible involved in the project.

In the near future, Oslo’s city planners plan to ban cars from the city center but an urban environment that is safe for pedestrians and cyclists is an important first step…(More)”