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Mathematical Modeling Used To Track and Label

Anti-Globalism writes to tell us that in a new book titled The Numerati, author Stephen Baker introduces us to some of the math wizardry that is used to label or track our movements through purchases, phone calls, internet usage and other habits. "One of the most promising laboratories for the Numerati is the workplace, where every keystroke, click, and e-mail can be studied. In a chapter called "The Worker," Baker travels to IBM, where mathematicians are building predictive models of their own colleagues. An excerpt: 'Samer Takriti, a Syrian-born mathematician. He heads up a team that's piecing together mathematical models of 50,000 of IBM's tech consultants. The idea is to pile up inventories of all of their skills and then to calculate, mathematically, how best to deploy them. I'm here to find out how Takriti and his colleagues go about turning IBM's workers into numbers. If this works, his team plans to apply these models to other companies and to automate much of what we now call management.'"

2 of 83 comments (clear)

  1. pseudo-continuance by easyTree · · Score: 5, Funny

    If this works, his team plans to apply these models to other companies and to automate much of what we now call management...

    ...The management function is reputed to make heavy use of the functions 'rand'.

  2. So scary its..... yawn. by Eth1csGrad1ent · · Score: 5, Funny

    Yawn. Take a look at my life if you want, but let me save you the calculations. I had a busy, if somewhat mundane, day at work after which I came home, ate some pizza, caught an episode of Top Gear and Boston Legal, checked in on my facebook account, and - as the missus is away - there is probably some internet porn in my near future. Tomorrow, being a Tuesday, will most likely turn out to be a carbon copy of today, with the following exceptions, Top Gear becomes Criminal Minds followed by NCIS instead of Boston Legal. THE END.