media

Driving government transformation through design thinking

Curated on September 4, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Michael McHugh at Federal Times: “According to Gartner, “Design thinking is a multidisciplinary process that builds solutions for complex, intractable problems in a technically feasible, commercially sustainable and emotionally meaningful way.”

Design thinking as an approach puts the focus on people — their likes, dislikes, desires and experience — for designing new services and products. It encourages a free flow of ideas within a team to build and test prototypes by setting a high tolerance for failure. The approach is more holistic, as it considers both human and technological aspects to cater to mission-critical needs. Due to its innovative and agile problem-solving technique, design thinking inspires teams to collaborate and contribute towards driving mission goals.

How Can Design Thinking Help Agencies?

Whether it is problem solving, streamlining a process or increasing the adoption rate of a new service, design thinking calls for agencies to be empathetic towards people’s needs while being open to continuous learning and a willingness to fail — fast. A fail-fast model enables agencies to detect errors during the course of finding a solution, in which they learn from the possible mistakes and then proceed to develop a more suitable solution that is likely to add value to the user.

Consider an example of a federal agency whose legacy inspection application was affecting the productivity of its inspectors. By leveraging an agile approach, the agency built a mobile inspection solution to streamline and automate the inspection process. The methodology involved multiple iterations based on observations and findings from inspector actions. Here is a step-by-step synopsis of this methodology:

Problem presentation: Identifying the problems faced by inspectors.
Empathize with users: Understanding the needs and challenges of inspectors.
Define the problem: Redefining the problem based on input from inspectors.
Team collaboration: Brainstorming and discussing multiple solutions.
Prototype creation: Determining and building viable design solutions.
Testing with constituents: Releasing the prototype and testing it with inspectors.
Collection of feedback: Incorporating feedback from pilot testing and making required changes.

The insights drawn from each step helped the agency to design a secure platform in the form of a mobile inspection tool, optimized for tablets with a smartphone companion app for enhanced mobility. Packed with features like rich media capture with video, speech-to-text and photographs, the mobile inspection tool dramatically reduces manual labor and speeds up the on-site inspection process. It delivers significant efficiencies by improving processes, increasing productivity and enhancing the visibility of information. Additionally, its integration with legacy systems helps leverage existing investments, therefore justifying the innovation, which is based on a tightly defined test and learn cycle….(More)”

The SAGE Handbook of Digital Journalism

Curated on August 31, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Book edited by Tamara Witschge, C. W. Anderson, David Domingo, and Alfred Hermida: “The production and consumption of news in the digital era is blurring the boundaries between professionals, citizens and activists. Actors producing information are multiplying, but still media companies hold central position. Journalism research faces important challenges to capture, examine, and understand the current news environment. The SAGE Handbook of Digital Journalism starts from the pressing need for a thorough and bold debate to redefine the assumptions of research in the changing field of journalism. The 38 chapters, written by a team of global experts, are organised into four key areas:

Section A: Changing Contexts

Section B: News Practices in the Digital Era

Section C: Conceptualizations of Journalism

Section D: Research Strategies

By addressing both institutional and non-institutional news production and providing ample attention to the question ‘who is a journalist?’ and the changing practices of news audiences in the digital era, this Handbook shapes the field and defines the roadmap for the research challenges that scholars will face in the coming decades….(More)”

Data and Democracy

Curated on August 30, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

(Free) book by Andrew Therriault: “The 2016 US elections will be remembered for many things, but for those who work in politics, 2016 may be best remembered as the year that the use of data in politics reached its maturity. Through a collection of essays from leading experts in the field, this report explores how political data science helps to drive everything from overall strategy and messaging to individual voter contacts and advertising.

Curated by Andrew Therriault, former Director of Data Science for the Democratic National Committee, this illuminating report includes first-hand accounts from Democrats, Republicans, and members of the media. Tech-savvy readers will get a comprehensive account of how data analysis has prevailed over political instinct and experience and examples of the challenges these practitioners face.

Essays include:

The Role of Data in Campaigns—Andrew Therriault, former Director of Data Science for the Democratic National Committee
Essentials of Modeling and Microtargeting—Dan Castleman, cofounder and Director of Analytics at Clarity Campaign Labs, a leading modeler in Democratic politics
Data Management for Political Campaigns—Audra Grassia, Deputy Political Director for the Democratic Governors Association in 2014
How Technology Is Changing the Polling Industry—Patrick Ruffini, cofounder of Echelon Insights and Founder/Chairman of Engage, was a digital strategist for President Bush in 2004 and for the Republican National Committee in 2006
Data-Driven Media Optimization—Alex Lundry, cofounder and Chief Data Scientist at Deep Root Analytics, a leading expert on media and voter analytics, electoral targeting, and political data mining
How (and Why) to Follow the Money in Politics—Derek Willis, ProPublica’s news applications developer, formerly with The New York Times
Digital Advertising in the Post-Obama Era—Daniel Scarvalone, Associate Director of Research and Data at Bully Pulpit Interactive (BPI), a digital marketer for the Democratic party
Election Forecasting in the Media—Natalie Jackson, Senior Polling Editor atThe Huffington Post…(More)”

Managing Federal Information as a Strategic Resource

Curated on August 29, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

White House: “Today the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is releasing an update to the Federal Government’s governing document for the management of Federal information resources: Circular A-130, Managing Information as a Strategic Resource.

The way we manage information technology(IT), security, data governance, and privacy has rapidly evolved since A-130 was last updated in 2000. In today’s digital world, we are creating and collecting large volumes of data to carry out the Federal Government’s various missions to serve the American people. This data is duplicated, stored, processed, analyzed, and transferred with ease. As government continues to digitize, we must ensure we manage data to not only keep it secure, but also allow us to harness this information to provide the best possible service to our citizens.

Today’s update to Circular A-130 gathers in one resource a wide range of policy updates for Federal agencies regarding cybersecurity, information governance, privacy, records management, open data, and acquisitions. It also establishes general policy for IT planning and budgeting through governance, acquisition, and management of Federal information, personnel, equipment, funds, IT resources, and supporting infrastructure and services. In particular, A-130 focuses on three key elements to help spur innovation throughout the government:

Real Time Knowledge of the Environment. In today’s rapidly changing environment, threats and technology are evolving at previously unimagined speeds. In such a setting, the Government cannot afford to authorize a system and not look at it again for years at a time. In order to keep pace, we must move away from periodic, compliance-driven assessment exercises and, instead, continuously assess our systems and build-in security and privacy with every update and re-design. Throughout the Circular, we make clear the shift away from check-list exercises and toward the ongoing monitoring, assessment, and evaluation of Federal information resources.
Proactive Risk Management. To keep pace with the needs of citizens, we must constantly innovate. As part of such efforts, however, the Federal Government must modernize the way it identifies, categorizes, and handles risk to ensure both privacy and security. Significant increases in the volume of data processed and utilized by Federal resources requires new ways of storing, transferring, and managing it Circular A-130 emphasizes the need for strong data governance that encourages agencies to proactively identify risks, determine practical and implementable solutions to address said risks, and implement and continually test the solutions. This repeated testing of agency solutions will help to proactively identify additional risks, starting the process anew.
Shared Responsibility. Citizens are connecting with each other in ways never before imagined. From social media to email, the connectivity we have with one another can lead to tremendous advances. The updated A-130 helps to ensure everyone remains responsible and accountable for assuring privacy and security of information – from managers to employees to citizens interacting with government services. …(More)”

Countries with strong public service media have less rightwing extremism

Curated on August 11, 2016August 20, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Tara Conlan in The Guardian: “Countries that have popular, well-funded public service broadcasters encounter less rightwing extremism and corruption and have more press freedom, a report from the European Broadcasting Union has found.

For the first time, an analysis has been done of the contribution of public service media, such as the BBC, to democracy and society.

Following Brexit and the rise in rightwing extremism across Europe, the report shows the impact strong publicly funded television and radio has had on voter turnout, control of corruption and press freedom.

The EBU, which founded Eurovision, carried out the study across 25 countries after noticing that the more well-funded a country’s public service outlets were, the less likely the nation was to endure extremism.

The report says that in “countries where public service media funding … is higher there tends to be more press freedom” and where they have a higher market share “there also tends to be a higher voter turnout”. It also says there is a strong correlation between how much of a country’s market its public service broadcaster has and the “demand for rightwing extremism” and “control of corruption”.

“These correlations are especially interesting given the current public debates about low participation in elections, corruption and the rise of far right politics across Europe,” said EBU head of media intelligence service Roberto Suárez Candel, who conducted the research….(More)”

Why Zika, Malaria and Ebola should fear analytics

Curated on August 9, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Frédéric Pivetta at Real Impact Analytics: “Big data is a hot business topic. It turns out to be an equally hot topic for the non profit sector now that we know the vital role analytics can play in addressing public health issues and reaching sustainable development goals.

Big players like IBM just announced they will help fight Zika by analyzing social media, transportation and weather data, among other indicators. Telecom data takes it further by helping to predict the spread of disease, identifying isolated and fragile communities and prioritizing the actions of aid workers.

The power of telecom data

Human mobility contributes significantly to epidemic transmission into new regions. However, there are gaps in understanding human mobility due to the limited and often outdated data available from travel records. In some countries, these are collected by health officials in the hospitals or in occasional surveys.

Telecom data, constantly updated and covering a large portion of the population, is rich in terms of mobility insights. But there are other benefits:

it’s recorded automatically (in the Call Detail Records, or CDRs), so that we avoid data collection and response bias.
it contains localization and time information, which is great for understanding human mobility.
it contains info on connectivity between people, which helps understanding social networks.
it contains info on phone spending, which allows tracking of socio-economic indicators.

Aggregated and anonymized, mobile telecom data fills the public data gap without questioning privacy issues. Mixing it with other public data sources results in a very precise and reliable view on human mobility patterns, which is key for preventing epidemic spreads.

Using telecom data to map epidemic risk flows

So how does it work? As in any other big data application, the challenge is to build the right predictive model, allowing decision-makers to take the most appropriate actions. In the case of epidemic transmission, the methodology typically includes five steps :

Identify mobility patterns relevant for each particular disease. For example, short-term trips for fast-spreading diseases like Ebola. Or overnight trips for diseases like Malaria, as it spreads by mosquitoes that are active only at night. Such patterns can be deduced from the CDRs: we can actually find the home location of each user by looking at the most active night tower, and then tracking calls to identify short or long-term trips. Aggregating data per origin-destination pairs is useful as we look at intercity or interregional transmission flows. And it protects the privacy of individuals, as no one can be singled out from the aggregated data.
Get data on epidemic incidence, typically from local organisations like national healthcare systems or, in case of emergency, from NGOs or dedicated emergency teams. This data should be aggregated on the same level of granularity than CDRs.
Knowing how many travelers go from one place to another, for how long, and the disease incidence at origin and destination, build an epidemiological model that can account for the way and speed of transmission of the particular disease.
With an import/export scoring model, map epidemic risk flows and flag areas that are at risk of becoming the new hotspots because of human travel.
On that base, prioritize and monitor public health measures, focusing on restraining mobility to and from hotspots. Mapping risk also allows launching prevention campaigns at the right places and setting up the necessary infrastructure on time. Eventually, the tool reduces public health risks and helps stem the epidemic.

That kind of application works in a variety of epidemiological contexts, including Zika, Ebola, Malaria, Influenza or Tuberculosis. No doubt the global boom of mobile data will proof extraordinarily helpful in fighting these fierce enemies….(More)”

5 Crowdsourced News Platforms Shaping The Future of Journalism and Reporting

Curated on August 9, 2016August 20, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Maria Krisette Capati at Crowdsourcing Week: “We are exposed to a myriad of news and updates worldwide. As the crowd becomes moreinvolved in providing information, adopting that ‘upload mindset’ coined by Will Merritt ofZooppa, access to all kinds of data is a few taps and clicks away….

Google News Lab – Better reporting and insightful storytelling

Last week, Google announced its own crowdsourced news platform dubbed News Lab as part of their efforts “to empower innovation at the intersection of technology and media.”

Scouting for real-time stories, updates, and breaking news is much easier and systematize for journalists worldwide. They can use Google’s tools for better reporting, data for insightful storytelling and programs to focus on the future of media, tackling this initiative in three ways.

“There’s a revolution in data journalism happening in newsrooms today, as more data sets and more tools for analysis are allowing journalists to create insights that were never before possible,” Google said.

Grasswire – first-hand information in real-time

The design looks bleak and simple, but the site itself is rich with content—first-hand information crowdsourced from Twitter users in real-time and verified. Austen Allred, co-founder of Grasswire was inspired to develop the platform after his “minor slipup” as the American Journalism Review (AJR) puts it, when he missed his train out of Shanghai that actually saved his life.

“The bullet train Allred was supposed to be on collided with another train in the Wenzhou area ofChina’s Zhejiang province,” AJR wrote. “Of the 1,630 passengers, 40 died, and another 210 were injured.” The accident happened in 2011. Unfortunately, the Chinese government made some cover upon the incident, which frustrated Allred in finding first-hand information.

After almost four years, Grasswire was launched, a website that collects real-time information from users for breaking news infused with crowdsourcing model afterward. “It’s since grown into a more complex interface, allowing users to curate selected news tweets by voting and verifying information with a fact-checking system,” AJR wrote, which made the verification of data open and systematized.

Rappler – Project Agos: a technology for disaster risk reduction

The Philippines is a favorite hub for typhoons. The aftermath of typhoon Haiyan was exceedingly disastrous. But the crowds were steadfast in uploading and sharing information and crowdsourcing became mainstream during the relief operations. Maria Ressa said that they had to educate netizens to use the appropriate hashtags for years (#nameoftyphoonPH, e.g. #YolandaPH) for typhoons to collect data on social media channels easily.

Education and preparation can mitigate the risks and save lives if we utilize the right technology and act accordingly. In her blog, After Haiyan: Crisis management and beyond, Maria wrote, “We need to educate not just the first responders and local government officials, but more importantly, the people in the path of the storms.” …

China’s CCDI app – Crowdsourcing political reports to crack down corruption practices

In China, if you want to mitigate or possible, eradicate corrupt practices, then there’s an app for that.China launched its own anti-corruption app called, Central Commission for Discipline InspectionWebsite App, allowing the public to upload text messages, photos and videos of Chinese officials’ any corrupt practices.

The platform was released by the government agency, Central Committee for Discipline Inspection.Nervous in case you’ll be tracked as a whistleblower? Interestingly, anyone can report anonymously.China Daily said, “the anti-corruption authorities received more than 1,000 public reports, and nearly70 percent were communicated via snapshots, text messages or videos uploaded,” since its released.Kenya has its own version, too, called Ushahidi using crowdmapping, and India’s I Paid a Bribe.

Newzulu – share news, publish and get paid

While journalists can get fresh insights from Google News Labs, the crowd can get real-time verified news from Grasswire, and CCDI is open for public, Newzulu crowdsourced news platforms doesn’t just invite the crowd to share news, they can also publish and get paid.

It’s “a community of over 150,000 professional and citizen journalists who share and break news to the world as it happens,” originally based in Sydney. Anyone can submit stories, photos, videos, and even stream live….(More)”

How Medical Crowdsourcing Empowers Patients & Doctors

Curated on August 5, 2016August 20, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Rob Stretch at Rendia: “Whether you’re a solo practitioner in a rural area, or a patient who’s bounced from doctor to doctor with adifficult–to-diagnose condition, there are many reasons why you might seek out expert medical advice from a larger group. Fortunately, in 2016, seeking feedback from other physicians or getting a second opinion is as easy as going online.

“Medical crowdsourcing” sites and apps are gathering steam, from provider-only forums likeSERMOsolves and Figure 1, to patient-focused sites like CrowdMed. They share the same mission of empowering doctors and patients, reducing misdiagnosis, and improving medicine. Is crowdsourcing the future of medicine? Read on to find out more.

Fixing misdiagnosis

An estimated 10 percent to 20 percent of medical cases are misdiagnosed, even more than drug errors and surgery on the wrong patient or body part, according to the National Center for Policy Analysis. And diagnostic errors are the leading cause of malpractice litigation. Doctors often report that with many of their patient cases, they would benefit from the support and advice of their peers.

The photo-sharing app for health professionals, Figure 1, is filling that need. Since we reported on it last year, the app has reached 1 million users and added a direct-messaging feature. The app is geared towards verified medical professionals, and goes to great lengths to protect patient privacy in keeping with HIPAAlaws. According to co-founder and CEO Gregory Levey, an average of 10,000 unique users check in toFigure 1 every hour, and medical professionals and students in 190 countries currently use the app.

Using Figure 1 to crowdsource advice from the medical community has saved at least one life. EmilyNayar, a physician assistant in rural Oklahoma and a self-proclaimed “Figure 1 addict,” told Wired magazine that because of photos she’d seen on the app, she was able to correctly diagnose a patient with shingles meningitis. Another doctor had misdiagnosed him previously, and the wrong medication could have killed him.

Collective knowledge at zero cost

In addition to serving as “virtual colleagues” for isolated medical providers, crowdsourcing forums can pool knowledge from an unprecedented number of doctors in different specialties and even countries,and can do so very quickly.

When we first reported on SERMO, the company billed itself as a “virtual doctors’ lounge.” Now, the global social network with 600,000 verified, credentialed physician members has pivoted to medical crowdsourcing with SERMOsolves, one of its most popular features, according to CEO Peter Kirk.

“Crowdsourcing patient cases through SERMOsolves is an ideal way for physicians to gain valuable information from the collective knowledge of hundreds of physicians instantly,” he said in a press release.According to SERMO, 3,500 challenging patient cases were posted in 2014, viewed 700,000 times, and received 50,000 comments. Most posted cases received responses within 1.5 hours and were resolved within a day. “We have physicians from more than 96 specialties and subspecialties posting on the platform, working together to share their valuable insights at zero cost to the healthcare system.”

While one early user of SERMO wrote on KevinMD.com that he felt the site’s potential was overshadowed by the anonymous rants and complaining, other users have noted that the medical crowdsourcing site has,like Figure 1, directly benefitted patients.

In an article on PhysiciansPractice.com, Richard Armstrong, M.D., cites the example of a family physician in Canada who posted a case of a young girl with an E. coli infection. “Physicians from around the world immediately began to comment and the recommendations resulted in a positive outcome for the patient.This instance offered cross-border learning experiences for the participating doctors, not only regarding the specific medical issue but also about how things are managed in different health systems,” wrote Dr.Armstrong.

Patients get proactive

While patients have long turned to social media to (questionably) crowdsource their medical queries, there are now more reputable sources than Facebook.

Tech entrepreneur Jared Heyman launched the health startup CrowdMed in 2013 after his sister endured a “terrible, undiagnosed medical condition that could have killed her,” he told the Wall Street Journal. She saw about 20 doctors over three years, racking up six-figure medical bills. The NIH Undiagnosed DiseaseProgram finally gave her a diagnosis: fragile X-associated primary ovarian insufficiency, a rare disease that affects just 1 in 15,000 women. A hormone patch resolved her debilitating symptoms….(More)”

How Technology Can Restore Our Trust in Democracy

Curated on August 5, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Cenk Sidar in Foreign Policy: “The travails of the Arab Spring, the rise of the Islamic State, and the upsurge of right-wing populism throughout the countries of West all demonstrate a rising frustration with the liberal democratic order in the years since the 2008 financial crisis. There is a growing intellectual consensus that the world is sailing into uncharted territory: a realm marked by authoritarianism, shallow populism, and extremism.

One way to overcome this global resentment is to use the best tools we have to build a more inclusive and direct democracy. Could new technologies such as Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Reality (VR), data analytics, crowdsourcing, and Blockchain help to restore meaningful dialogue and win back people’s hearts and minds?

Underpinning our unsettling current environment is an irony: Thanks to modern communication technology, the world is more connected than ever — but average people feel more disconnected. In the United States, polls show that trust in government is at a 50-year low. Frustrated Trump supporters and the Britons who voted for Brexit both have a sense of having “lost out” as the global elite consolidates its power and becomes less responsive to the rest of society. This is not an irrational belief: Branko Milanovic, a leading inequality scholar, has found that people in the lower and middle parts of rich countries’ income distributions have been the losers of the last 15 years of globalization.

The same 15 years have also brought astounding advances in technology, from the rise of the Internet to the growing ubiquity of smartphones. And Western society has, to some extent, struggled to find its bearings amid this transition. Militant groups seduce young people through social media. The Internet enables consumers to choose only the news that matches their preconceived beliefs, offering a bottomless well of partisan fury and conspiracy theories. Cable news airing 24/7 keeps viewers in a state of agitation. In short, communication technologies that are meant to bring us together end up dividing us instead (and not least because our politicians have chosen to game these tools for their own advantage).

It is time to make technology part of the solution. More urgently than ever, leaders, innovators, and activists need to open up the political marketplace to allow technology to realize its potential for enabling direct citizen participation. This is an ideal way to restore trust in the democratic process.

As the London School of Economics’ Mary Kaldor put it recently: “The task of global governance has to be reconceptualized to make it possible for citizens to influence the decisions that affect their lives — to reclaim substantive democracy.” One notable exception to the technological disconnect has been fundraising, as candidates have tapped into the Internet to enable millions of average voters to donate small sums. With the right vision, however, technological innovation in politics could go well beyond asking people for money….(More)”