I wonder if we can contact ESP and ask them what their processes have been in writing about and representing what happened there. The prison has been closed for almost fifty years now, and regardless not everyone who works there will have had direct experience with the prison when it was open. We can see what mindset we should have while working…[Read more]

I really appreciate the point about knowing your data before performing analysis, because it can be deceptively easy to start haphazardly drawing conclusions. There’s always the famous Mark Twain saying: “There are three types of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” Also, coming from anthropology, a field where people tried to pretend for too…[Read more]

Personally what I find fascinating about metadata is what it says about the producer of that metadata. This works in both their terminology – i.e. our “producer” versus “brand” versus etc discussion on Wednesday – but also their methodology. How do they envision the organization of data? Is it a tree to them? Is is something that can be…[Read more]

Do we have the rights to disseminate the thoughts of historical figures? Personally, I’d generally say that if they are being defined as a “historical figure”, yes. Different perspectives help us to better understand our history and combat any single narrative. It’s like the trick of taking the average of a crowd’s estimate and getting fairly…[Read more]

I’m surprised that I really haven’t heard this aspect of climate change discussed before. I’ve heard “don’t leave your charger plugged in” and “Try to limit computer usage” – or, what an individual can do to lower their carbon footprint with technology. From a programming or computer modeling aspect I’ve heard always simplify your code and your…[Read more]