Report by Phoensight: “With the emergence of increasing computational power, high cloud storage capacity and big data comes an eager anticipation of one of the biggest IT transformations of our society today. Open data has an instrumental role to play in our digital revolution by creating unprecedented opportunities for governments and businesses to leverage off previously unavailable information to strengthen their analytics and decision making for new client experiences. Whilst virtually every business recognises the value of data and the importance of the analytics built on it, the ability to realise the potential for maximising revenue and cost savings... (More >)
How to See Gentrification Coming
Nathan Collins at Pacific Standard: “Depending on whom you ask, gentrification is either damaging, not so bad, or maybe even good for the low-income people who live in what we euphemistically call up-and-coming neighborhoods. Either way, it’d be nice for everybody to know which neighborhoods are going to get revitalized/eviscerated next. Now, computer scientists think they’ve found a way to do exactly that: Using Twitter and Foursquare, map the places visited by the most socially diverse crowds. Those, it turns out, are the most likely to gentrify. Led by University of Cambridge graduate student Desislava Hristova, the researchers began... (More >)
Social app for refugees and locals translates in real-time
Springwise: “Europe is in the middle of a major refugee crisis, with more than one million migrants arriving in 2015 alone. Now, developers in Stockholm are coming up with new ways for arrivals to integrate into their new homes. Welcome! is an app based in Sweden, a country that has operated a broadly open policy to immigration in recent years. The developers say the app aims to break down social and language barriers between Swedes and refugees. Welcome! is translated into Arabic, Persian, Swedish and English, and it enables users to create, host and join activities, as well as... (More >)
Pigeon patrol takes flight to tackle London’s air pollution crisis
Adam Vaughan at The Guardian: They’ve been driven from Trafalgar square for being a nuisance, derided as rats with wings and maligned as a risk to public health. But now pigeons could play a small part in helping Londoners overcome one of the capital’s biggest health problems – its illegal levels of air pollution blamed for thousands of deaths a year. On Monday, a flock of half a dozen racing pigeons were set loose from a rooftop in Brick Lane by pigeon fancier, Brian Woodhouse, with one strapped with a pollution sensor to its back and one with a... (More >)
Cities, Data, and Digital Innovation
Paper by Mark Kleinman: “Developments in digital innovation and the availability of large-scale data sets create opportunities for new economic activities and new ways of delivering city services while raising concerns about privacy. This paper defines the terms Big Data, Open Data, Open Government, and Smart Cities and uses two case studies – London (U.K.) and Toronto – to examine questions about using data to drive economic growth, improve the accountability of government to citizens, and offer more digitally enabled services. The paper notes that London has been one of a handful of cities at the forefront of the... (More >)
The 4 Types of Cities and How to Prepare Them for the Future
John D. Macomber at Harvard Business Review: “The prospect of urban innovation excites the imagination. But dreaming up what a “smart city” will look like in some gleaming future is, by its nature, a utopian exercise. The messy truth is that cities are not the same, and even the most innovative approach can never achieve universal impact. What’s appealing for intellectuals in Copenhagen or Amsterdam is unlikely to help millions of workers in Jakarta or Lagos. To really make a difference, private entrepreneurs and civic entrepreneurs need to match projects to specific circumstances. An effective starting point is to... (More >)
Letting the people decide … but will government listen?
David Donaldson in The Mandarin: “If we now have the technology to allow citizens to vote directly on all issues, what job remains for public servants? While new technology may provide new options to contribute, the really important thing is governmental willingness to actually listen, says Maria Katsonis, the Victorian Department of Premier and Cabinet’s director of equality. The balance between citizen consultation and public service expertise in decision-making remains a hot debate, with South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill warning last year that while expertise in policy is important, overzealous bureaucrats and politicians can disenfranchise citizens. The internet is... (More >)
Open data and (15 million!) new measures of democracy
Joshua Tucker in the Washington Post: “Last month the University of Gothenberg’s V-Dem Institute released a new“Varieties of Democracy” dataset. It provides about 15 million data points on democracy, including 39 democracy-related indices. It can be accessed at v-dem.net along with supporting documentation. I asked Staffan I. Lindberg, Director of the V-Dem Institute and one of the directors of the project, a few questions about the new data. What follows is a lightly edited version of his answers. Women’s Political Empowerment Index for Southeast Asia (Data: V-Dem data version 5; Figure V-Dem Institute, University of Gothenberg, Sweden) Joshua Tucker:... (More >)
Big data’s big role in humanitarian aid
Mary K. Pratt at Computerworld: “Hundreds of thousands of refugees streamed into Europe in 2015 from Syria and other Middle Eastern countries. Some estimates put the number at nearly a million. The sheer volume of people overwhelmed European officials, who not only had to handle the volatile politics stemming from the crisis, but also had to find food, shelter and other necessities for the migrants. Sweden, like many of its European Union counterparts, was taking in refugees. The Swedish Migration Board, which usually sees 2,500 asylum seekers in an average month, was accepting 10,000 per week. “As you can... (More >)
Open Data Is Changing the World in Four Ways…
Stefaan Verhulst at The GovLab Blog: “New repository of case studies documents the impact of open data globally: odimpact.org. Despite global commitments to and increasing enthusiasm for open data, little is actually known about its use and impact. What kinds of social and economic transformation has open data brought about, and what is its future potential? How—and under what circumstances—has it been most effective? How have open data practitioners mitigated risks and maximized social good? Even as proponents of open data extol its virtues, the field continues to suffer from a paucity of empiricalevidence. This limits our understanding of... (More >)
