Information Operations (IO) – Page 353 – Public Intelligence Blog

2014/03/18

Patrick Meier: Grassroots UAVs for Disaster Response — Actionable Timely Locally-Controlled, Locally-Exploitable

Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Drones & UAVs, Ethics, Government

Grassroots UAVs for Disaster Response

I was recently introduced to a new initiative that seeks to empower grassroots communities to deploy their own low-cost xUAVs. The purpose of this initiative? To support locally-led disaster response efforts and in so doing transfer math, science and engineering skills to local communities. The “x” in xUAV refers to expendable. The initiative is a partnership between California State University (Long Beach), University of Hawaii, Embry Riddle, The Philippine Council for Industry, Energy & Emerging Technology Research & Development, Skyeye, Aklan State University and Ateneo de Manila University in the Philippines. The team is heading back to the Philippines next week for their second field mission. This blog post provides a short overview of the project’s approach and the results from their first mission, which took place during December 2013-February 2014.

Read full post with images.

2014/03/172014/03/17

Berto Jongman: 20 Crucial Terms Every 21st Century Futurist Should Know

Advanced Cyber/IO

20 Crucial Terms Every 21st Century Futurist Should Know

George Dvorsky

We live in an era of accelerating change, when scientific and technological advancements are arriving rapidly. As a result, we are developing a new language to describe our civilization as it evolves. Here are 20 terms and concepts that you'll need to navigate our future.

Back in 2007 I put together a list of terms every self-respecting futurist should be familiar with. But now, some seven years later, it's time for an update. I reached out to several futurists, asking them which terms or phrases have emerged or gained relevance since that time. These forward-looking thinkers provided me with some fascinating and provocative suggestions — some familiar to me, others completely new, and some a refinement of earlier conceptions. Here are their submissions, including a few of my own.

LIST ONLY

1. Co-veillance
2. Multiplex Parenting
3. Technological Unemployment
4. Substrate-Autonomous Person
5. Intelligence Explosion
6. Longevity Dividend
7. Repressive Desublimation
8. Intelligence Amplification
9. Effective Altruism
10. Moral Enhancement
11. Proactionary Principle
12. Mules
13. Anthropocene
14. Eroom's Law
15. Evolvability Risk
16. Artificial Wombs
17. Whole Brain Emulations
18. Weak AI
19. Neural Coupling
20. Computational Overhang

Read full article with expansions, links, and related stories.

2014/03/172014/03/17

Kenneth Mikkelsen: Secret Power of Generalists — And How They Will Rule the Future

Advanced Cyber/IO, Commercial Intelligence, Cultural Intelligence

2014/03/172014/03/17

Jean Lievens: Net Neutrality — Government Betraying the Public Trust?

IO Impotency

Net neutrality: Is the Internet about to change?

The FCC has applied ‘neutrality' to its oversight of the Internet: Everyone’s data reaches the same audience in the same way. But the Internet’s gatekeepers, such as Verizon and Comcast, have been trying to reshape the federal regulatory landscape.

The executive summary of the Federal Communications Commission‘s National Broadband Plan would never be mistaken for a Dan Brown page turner, but right at the top of the first page it makes a statement that is central to the future of the Internet in the United States.

The comment could easily be dismissed as bureaucratic hyperbole, but it raises an important point that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is even now struggling to resolve: Has the Internet become so vital to national welfare that it should be run for the public good, or is it just a business that can be run primarily for profit?

Read full article.

Continue reading “Jean Lievens: Net Neutrality — Government Betraying the Public Trust?”

2014/03/152014/03/15

Stephen E. Arnold: Google Trends Fail Badly — Algorithms Get Lost and Are No Substitute for Humans with Intelligence and Integrity

IO Impotency

Google Flu Trends: How Algorithms Get Lost

March 15, 2014

Run a query for Google Flu Trends on Google. The results point to the Google Flu Trends Web site at http://bit.ly/1ny9j58. The graphs and charts seem authoritative. I find the colors and legends difficult to figure out, but Google knows best. Or does it?

A spate of stories have appeared in New Scientist, Smithsonian, and Time that pick up the threat that Google Flu Trends does not work particularly well. The Science Magazine podcast presents a quite interesting interview with David Lazar, one of the authors of “The Parable of Google Flu: Traps in Big Data Analysis.”

The point of the Lazar article and the greedy recycling of the analysis is that algorithms can be incorrect. What is interesting is the surprise that creeps into the reports of Google’s infallible system being dead wrong.

For example, Smithsonian Magazine’s “Why Google Flu Trends Can’t Track the Flu (Yet)” states, “The vaunted big data project falls victim to periodic tweaks in Google’s own search algorithms.” The write continues:

Continue reading “Stephen E. Arnold: Google Trends Fail Badly — Algorithms Get Lost and Are No Substitute for Humans with Intelligence and Integrity”

2014/03/142014/03/14

Nik Peachey: Marginnote for PDF Documents

IO Tools

Marginnote – for making notes on PDF readings

This looks like a really useful study tool for working on PDF documents, especially the ability to organise notes with mind maps.

The notes in the visible margin

Other productivity apps don’t let users see their notes and their main document text at the same time, However, MarginNote Reader is totally different and completely better! Now, users can see their notes and main document text all at once, without having to deal with distracting or annoying pop-ups. It’s a fundamentally more intuitive and productive way to get anything done, whether at school or at work.

Organize notes by outline & mindmap

MarginNote Reader also eliminates the need for users to lug around heavy, bulky textbooks and notebooks. All of their data is ready for them in one place, and users can organize and reorganize their notes with the swipe of a finger! This ease- of-use is one key difference between MarginNote and other note apps.

Other key MarginNote special features

Seamless syncing with Evernote.The power to organize notes by outline and mindmap integration.The ability to create outlines of important note files, in order to easily and quickly find specific points without having to scroll through their entire document. The option to export markup and notes in print-ready format. The capacity to store notes on the iPad or in the Cloud.

Learn more.

2014/03/142014/03/14

Robin Good: Tools for Kids to Curate Content on New Topics

IO Tools

Content Curation: How To Help Students Learn, Discover and Make Sense of New Topics All By Themselves

Here's a short first-hand report highlighting how an 8th grade social studies class teacher (Terri Inloes) has fully leveraged the content curation potential to let her students dive, discover and make sense of topics (in this case social reform movements) that they had not studied before. All by themselves.

Here the steps taken to make this happen:

a) By using the Question Formulation Technique, the teacher prepared pairs of photographs representing each of the reform movements, one picture dating back to the late 19th century, and another representing where that social reform movement stands in today’s society.

b) After checking out all of the photos, students settled on the pair of pictures that most caught their interest.

c) They brainstormed and refined a set of specific questions, and then shared their thinking with the class.

d) With the feedback received they selected the topic which they would curate.

Continue reading “Robin Good: Tools for Kids to Curate Content on New Topics”