The Power of Data in the Modern Age

Since the invention of computers human knowledge has moved en masse online, turning once-fixed distribution channels between established authors and their audiences into exponential networks of content creators.

In that time, the presentation of information rapidly evolved to fill the new digital void. Paper and pen became word processing. As soon as the Internet was born we had blogging. Twitter created the modern newspaper and Tinder condensed our mating dance into a 2-sentence paragraph and finally, just an Instagram handle.

Yet these iterations on information distribution just scratch the surface of the internet’s true power: the exponential (read: limitless) capacity for content. In eliminating the constraint paper enforced — namely, the flat, fixed surface — humans created hypertexts. And in doing so, information became more than a message — it became structural. One way to look at it is: we literally wrote the Internet into existence.

Somewhere in the middle of this highly condensed timeline, the information available became overwhelming and soon grew — not surprisingly — out of control. Our creations surpassed our cognitive capacities. For instance, there are over 8 million Google+ pages alone. Like Borges’ Library of Babel (a fictional library which contained infinite incarnations of text) we find that within this digital universe representing the sprawling nodes of our collective hive mind there is immense brilliance — but also infinite madness.

This madness is a natural product of the human mind, which is the most beautiful kind of maze: a labyrinth. Without constraints, our intelligence expands — and the Internet has no end. Metadata (i.e. data that describes data) is one way of organizing the available information into a cohesive path; something resembling a map.

Today, managing this onslaught of data requires a method of categorization that effectively navigates a non-linear network. For instance: hashtags, when used appropriately, are actually quite helpful as they are designed to isolate and identify media keywords. The purpose of the hashtag is twofold: it effectively cuts through the noise of many people producing ridiculous amounts of trivial data while providing insight into why that data is relevant.

“As humans, we have a deeply primal desire to create a story from our data.”

Our quest as a digital culture is to organize the information we continually and consistently generate as a species in order to understand what is happening around and inside us. Quantitative content is, simply put, meaningful information. Yet the bigger question is: how do we define meaningful? The short answer is: we don’t. Or rather, everyone defines it in different ways. Yet given large enough amounts of data, patterns emerge. This emergent information is the shared language of the people. Not because it’s the dominant language of a specific culture or region but because your mom uses “on fleek” correctly, even if she doesn’t understand the why it originated or what it refers to. We’ve codified these patterns into trending topics, or new words on Urban Dictionary, but we still don’t know how to decipher them.

What is interesting about quantitative content is that it has no bias. It doesn’t describe the event, it only indicates that one is happening. Only then can we apply our insight in the act of interpretation. The danger here is that we are beautifully — and oftentimes blindly — human. Our prejudices, our opinions, and our feelings contain our hopes about what we’d like to see happen. As humans, we have a deeply primal desire to create a story from our data.

As a strategist, what this tells me is that we need a new system for synthesis, or a more productive way to interpret data around us. Scientists are seeing that data that reflects harsh realities around us doesn’t incentivize action. A negative framing increases resistance instead. What we are learning is that how we interpret data determines our collective direction. It is up to us to write the story that will shape our lives.

In 1972 the Kingdom of Bhutan developed a new metric for understanding development in their country. Rather than basing progress on economic growth, they determined a new GNH — otherwise known as Gross National Happiness — an indicator based on environmental preservation and quality of life. In this context, each defined signifier became an opportunity for self-improvement, a way of orienting information toward the progression of humankind.

The internet-as-information-empire demonstrates the power of data in our world. We must ask ourselves: What story do we want to write? Given wings, any animal will fly. Data itself is never bad or good — but without the right framework for analysis, we will struggle to define what answers we seek.

The first version of this essay was originally published in the March issue of the Shape Shift Report by Matte Black.