Did you see the robotic pigeon flying around today? Did you get a chance to meet Satoshi Nakamoto?

Luckily you didn’t miss out on this, as they were not there. But as you can’t split yourself in two, or even four, you probably did miss some of the magic today. Don't worry, read on, we got the highlights covered for you.

A quickie:

It was a very quantifiable day: 2000 Data Natives, four stages, thousands of coffees and one fluffy dog at the co-working space. What was hardly quantifiable: your endless energy and the fresh amount of information overflowing in our brains.

This year’s Data Natives theme is ‘quickening’ and boy, did we got blown away by the fast-changing future we faced in the talks: inclusive healthcare, power to the data producer with blockchain and even the death of big data.

Think of future generations, not just in unicorns

“Open source the shit out of it” is the plight of Bas de Witte, director of Digital Health at IBM, as we decide on the future of medical AI systems. Bas says we should not scare away from technology, but make use of it, in order to disrupt healthcare as we know it today. Yes, silicon valley is built by gold diggers. But a more conscious movement, could provide more accessible and affordable healthcare to the seventy percent of the world in need of it.

Big data is like teenage sex....

Everyone talks about it, nobody really knows how to do it. Marc Weimer-Hablitzel, principal for etventure, had some shocking news in store: Big data is dead. “It started all so nicely”, he said. “It was like oil to dig out of the ground to get instantly rich.” But still, only 15% of data projects succeed. According to Marc, we need to move from big data to ‘data thinking’. First, determine where the value is, only then start digging for data.

If you have powerful technologies: be careful

Moderator Yann Leretaille, founder of the Good Technology Collective, started the data ethics discussion with a nightmare scenario: what if you become the engineer who finds out years later you created a technological monster? The panel agrees techies should be careful while creating systems. “AI machines are going to take key decisions in our lives’, said data scientist Shlomo Hod. “We should be aware that bias can get into these systems.” Jennifer Ahrens, analyst at Immobilien Scout24, wants to make social groups and organisations aware of how their data is valuable. “Not just Google should be having this conversation, but all of society.”

The Futrure is Calling 

Most people think of Google as an evil little man, rubbing his hands, ready to sell their personal information. This is how Uwe Diegel, head of product management at Healthbank, describes our fear of technology. It is understandable, he argues, but it keeps us from using the data correctly and making the world a little better. “The more information we have, the better healthcare we will have for every single person in this room.” The person becoming 150 years old is already born. The future super elderly will face more diseases, so we need more for our healthcare system, he argued.

The Data Natives Team
P.S.: Don't forget to collect your food voucher at the registration tomorrow morning!