That's a wrap on DN18! We want to extend a huge thank you to all of speakers, sponsors, partners- and of course, our 2,000 attendees- for making this year's Data Natives our biggest and best edition yet.

For those of you looking for slides, photos or videos from the conference: they're coming. We'll send all of the relevant information in the next week. 

We can't quite believe the conference of the future is over for another year, and we can't wait to welcome you to DN19 (super-discounted early bird tickets are on sale now- scroll down to find out more!)

ICYMI: Day 2 Highlights

‘We are all astronauts', read the quote on the wall of the IBM stage. Indeed, we felt like this today: floating between stages, drawn to the gravity of each talk. In the hallways or on the stairs, we stared at maps, wondering where to travel to next. On a mission for information.

Did you get stuck in the gravitational field of one floor? No problem, we got the highlights for you here. Read on and explore the rest of space.

Know Thy Spaceship

“What spaceship would you choose,” asked Cassie Kozyrkov, chief decision scientist at Google, “One that never flew but you thoroughly tested it, or one where you have no idea how the thing flies, but it successfully flew many times before?” Cassie would pick the one she tested, as crafted testing is the basis of trust. With this metaphor, Data Natives were asked to look at AI with more of an understanding of its ingredients.

Data Done Good

On the third floor, the pitches of start-ups for a better world were on fire. “Fear not the data” was the prevailing message. With Civocracy, founder Benjamin Snow wants to encourage citizens to share their data with local governments, in order to improve their communities. Let the voices of citizens be heard and cure populism, was his message to Data Natives.

Lea Dias, health strategy consultant, showed Data Natives a photo of a gigantic doughnut-shaped limestone, a currency. When inhabitants of the island of Yap wanted to trade a stone, they would have to get permission from all the inhabitants of the village. The same transparency and decentralised decisions making is needed in healthcare, she argued. Blockchain is the solution to identify fake drugs in the market and to complicated medical supply chains.

What makes a good company? Good competition, said Ingrid Willems of Datascouts. But most companies don't have a clue what their competition is up to. But the data and the tools to research are available to all the entrepreneurs in the audience and Ingrid encouraged them to use these.

According to Paul Radtke of Zoi, different departments in a company often sit on their own data like kings. But the rest of the company misses out on the insights. Through a regulatory core, said Paul, insights could be shared for the benefit of the whole company.

Time flies when you are having fun, especially with a conference theme such as ‘quickening’. So take it easy this weekend and let the data soak in. But remember, data itself is not information, as was said during the panel on HR tech. It is all about what you do with the data. So go out into the world, Data Natives, and use the data wisely.

The Data Natives Team