Data: To share, or not to share, that is the question –

I’ve just recently finished the highly engaging and thought-provoking book, Search: How the Data Explosion Makes Us Smarter.

Within the book, author Stefan Weitz (Senior Director at Microsoft), explores a number of areas; from where search came from (binary code for the computers of the day) to, more importantly, where search can lead us.

And lead us is an integral part of the book, as technological advancements, reduction in hardware costs, and (ultimately) the data explosion have provided an almost blank canvas of where we, as a generation, can draw our own future.

I guess this is where my article is angled. A point in the book, outside of the utopian world in which search can act as the ‘hinge’ to the culpable web, is the chapter that looks at the challenges to this new world.

It will come as no surprise that data, and more importantly, the sharing of personal data, to create more sophisticated solutions to very complex and non-complex issues, is one of the main areas of contention.

It is at this point that I should state that I am tech geek and fully embrace (to a point) technological advancements that pitch to make my life easier – in a geeky way.

Therefore the juncture in which we now find ourselves; approaching the Internet of Things (IoT) and the Connected Home era, is one that I fully welcome and will personally embrace.

This isn’t just to make a cup of coffee from my smartphone. It is to truly welcome digital into our everyday life, and not just onto a platform with a screen.

The possibilities are endless and transcend into new ecosystems. The fact that this world can then be personalised to our very specific individual requirements, and learn about our behaviours, to then provide even deeper solutions, is scarily exciting. Indeed Weitz explores and states that things can start to go beyond the realms of Sci-Fi.

But this comes at a cost: (smart) data. And lots of it - continually.

I’m not just talking about consent of cookies on a website which, with the aid of the EU Cookie Directive, has (for the majority) convinced consumers that cookies are good.

I am talking about real data; think family medical data, linked through to supermarket purchasing habits, to a wearable tech device that cross-references physical activity, weight fluctuations, blood sugar levels, to then give an output of how likely you are to contract type 2 diabetes.

Or, where I truly see the exciting overlay, if the all of this data can actually lead to the consumer using this information to suggest changes, if in danger, to their diet and provide an exercise plan based on known lifestyle patterns. Pretty powerful stuff I am sure you will agree.

There are countless other scenarios in the real world that are far more eloquently described and explored by Weitz but, for the purpose of this post, the medical implications are the most exciting and potentially the easiest to way to describe the benefits to the general public.

The part in Weitz’s book that really made me think was the following paragraph from guest contributor, Marc Davis, who wrote:

“Let’s say we’ve got roughly a million years that we’ve been homo sapiens, give or take, and so we’ve got a million years of experience, phenomenology, and cultural practice around what it means to be a physical self, a physical person.

About ten thousands years ago, depending on how you count it or if you want to go back to the Code of Ur-Nama, which was actually before Hammurabi, we had the notion of a legal person, which defined what you can do and what you can’t do, and so you had a level of affordance or structure on behaviour and action.

Now, in the last fifteen years, a new type of person has been created, the digital person, and what hasn’t been sorted out yet is exactly what that’s going to be, who’s going to control it, and what the relationships are between the digital person, the legal person, and the physical person.”

This really hit home as technically this generations advancement, the internet, has only been around for 15 or so years. That is all. Yet we are trying to answer a very complex serious of questions, very quickly and without presenting all of the facts to the consumer – or where the benefits could lead us.

Of course consumer protection from ‘bad actors’, as Weitz would call them in his book, is of paramount. But so is fully understanding of what this new digital world can provide – no, not Terminator or Short Circuit scenarios..

And it is here that I state my call to arms. Within this industry, digital has now created some of the largest global brands. Brands that are creating ‘things’ that I am sure ‘we’ could not even think of ourselves – driverless cars? – yet, talk data, and it is almost a cue to be placed on the back foot; to defend ones actions.

I personally think that we are at a dangerous cross-roads which, in my opinion, we, as an industry, should go on the offensive to fully educate the consumer to the possibilities of this new world.

Let’s not just feel happy with ourselves when we mention the IoT or Connected Home at a conference, or in a client meeting, let’s fully disclose what is needed, and why, to create a digital society. And if this does not appeal, once all the information is provided, how can this be turned off.

I am talking the largest global digital brands’ creating and maintaining campaigns that inform the public in the way the public want to digest, and not the way the brand wants it to be consumed.

Personally I cannot wait to see where the next few years take us and what can be achieved. I just hope it isn’t stopped before it is even had the chance to start. To share, or not to share, that is the question?

What are your thoughts? Agree/disagree? Or just a relief to get to the end?!