Cities across the globe are finding innovative ways to apply smart technologies to help improve the lives of their citizens and communities. At the Smart Cities New York conference this week, public sector and business leaders will gather to share pain points and best practices. One of those shared struggles...
In a packed room at City Hall on Monday, Council Member James Vacca heard testimony from city officials, technologists, and civil rights advocates on his proposed legislation for transparency in the use of algorithms for city services. Vacca said that the legislation is, to the best of his knowledge, the...
Algorithms can easily reflect societal inequalities, but at least one company is trying to build a fair recommendation system.
Safety Check—the crisis response tool that allows users to check in as 'safe' on Facebook—has some of its critics still wanting more.
Zuckerberg, Dorsey, and other social media giants will be remembered, not by their business successes, but by how well they tackle the problem of the filter bubble.
There is a story in the Quran about a group of Christians who escaped persecution by taking refuge in a cave. There they fell into a very long sleep which they thought only lasted a day or two. But it actually had lasted for centuries. When they woke they were...
Weapons of math destruction are characterized by their opacity, their power, their widespread use, their poor definitions of success, and their engendering of pernicious feedback loops.