Summary

A look at how Big Data can be put to positive use, from helping users break bad habits to tracking the global spread of disease.

Big Data is made up of lots of little data: numbers entered into cell phones, addresses entered into GPS devices, visits to websites, online purchases, ATM transactions, and any other activity that leaves a digital trail. Although the abuse of Big Data--surveillance, spying, hacking--has made headlines, it shouldn't overshadow the abundant positive applications of Big Data. In Reality Mining , Nathan Eagle and Kate Greene cut through the hype and the headlines to explore the positive potential of Big Data, showing the ways in which the analysis of Big Data ("Reality Mining") can be used to improve human systems as varied as political polling and disease tracking, while considering user privacy.

Eagle, a recognized expert in the field, and Greene, an experienced technology journalist, describe Reality Mining at five different levels: the individual, the neighborhood and organization, the city, the nation, and the world. For each level, they first offer a nontechnical explanation of data collection methods and then describe applications and systems that have been or could be built. These include a mobile app that helps smokers quit smoking; a workplace "knowledge system"; the use of GPS, Wi-Fi, and mobile phone data to manage and predict traffic flows; and the analysis of social media to track the spread of disease. Eagle and Greene argue that Big Data, used respectfully and responsibly, can help people live better, healthier, and happier lives.

Choice Review

Eagle (CEO, Jana; adjunct, Harvard and Northeastern) and Greene (freelance journalist) believe that engineers with access to big data can make the world a better place. Although Eagle has authored dozens of academic papers over the past decade, in this book, the authors explicitly choose to focus on corporate projects rather than academic work. The result is a volume that is as dehumanizing as the term social engineering and as lacking in rigor as a trade magazine. Much of the information provided is anecdotal or conjectural: "company X is doing Y, which might solve problem Z." Privacy concerns can cause public relations problems, but those might be overcome by providing incentives. The book is organized around four granularity levels: individual, community, national, and global. However, the presentation repeats common material across all four levels, such as the use of call data records and certain corporate projects. People not already familiar with the extent of their "digital exhaust" may find the book enlightening, as might people who do not know that disparate data sets can be combined to uncover hidden relationships. But readers looking to understand the dark side of big data (its use by marketers, criminals, and malevolent governments) will find few insights here. Summing Up: Optional. General readers. --Christopher Vickery, Queens College of CUNY