Stephen Baker of Newsweek, starts this week’s essay with the following line:
About three minutes into his speech on Jan. 20, President Barack Obama spoke a word never before uttered in a Presidential inauguration speech: “data.”.
The Obama campaign managed data like no other campaign before. One would expect, and hope, that data, and the interpretation thereof, will have a prominent place in policy debates.
Which brings me to my point – data is essential to building an information stream. Without data, you have no information from which to make valid choices. No data – no information — and you have either market failure, public failure or both.
How many bills do you think become law – federal, state and local, without data. How many bills become law without sufficient data? And how many bills become law without necessary data?
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Chasing the link to The Numerati (Baker’s book), led me to ThinkingAnalytically – where I found a mindmap of the book. Remember to check out mindmeister for more info.
