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Stephen Feber

Owner - Stephen Feber Ltd, Stephen Feber Ltd - Owner

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To create global real time data visualisation screens in every city round the world & on also the web.

With the work of Hans Rosling and data visualisers round the world at research centres we are beginning to see flows of people, information and power in completely new ways. We can use these powerful visualisation techniques to re- see our world.

Topics: crosscutting concerns social media tedx
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    David Warren 500+

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    TED AttendeeTEDx OrganizerAssociate
    Mar 23 2011: Realtime data visualization is vital. It's simply feedback on our collective habits and behavior. Every car should tell us MPG as well as cost per mile. Every home should tell us energy costs per room. Cities need to show us how many people go hungry every day, and what are the trends over time. Are we improving or not on a whole range of scales that people can understand. We need to fully grok "We". Let's make it happen! Where is the sign-up sheet?
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    Stephen Feber 200+

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    Mar 20 2011: Maybe I shouldn't have put Rosling's name in at the start of the thread! And I agree data visualisation is short on emotion. With due deference to MM - in data visualisation the medium is not the message - there's much that is in the pipeline - look at Carlo Ratti's talk or Aaron Koblin's from this year's TED. What is beginning to be possible is seeing what we have not seen before - flows of goods, services, energy, people. Once you can see them you can understand them and plan for them differently, especially see where they interact and where there is waste of energy and time. Visualisation can provide powerful backcasting and therefore forecasting - and this is essential because we're poor at foresight (I don't mean prediction). Because we'll be able also to do this in real time - particularly for cities - we will be able to optimise energy use, transport use and make cities much more efficient. Visualisation is also starting to show new markets and new opportunities. And if you look at visualisation in science, engineering, architecture and design - you see we're on the edge of a visualisation revolution.
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    Debra Smith 200+

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    Mar 20 2011: It seems to me that the infographic is everywhere these days and it is used to great effect in the news media and in many reports. I welcome them because in an instant the relationships are clear.
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    Randall Bretz 500+

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    TED AttendeeTEDx Organizer
    Mar 19 2011: I've watched Rosling's various videos a number of times, but what touches me most deeply are the stories behind the data he presents. I think of the young man who generated electricity in a village in Africa from a windmill he fabricated with old car parts...that story told me more about what's happening in Africa than Rosling's data presentations. I think about the schools that Mortenson has helped build in Afghanistan and Pakistan (read Three Cups of Tea) and those stories touch me deeply.

  • Ed Schulte 50+

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    Mar 19 2011: Stephen


    the communication theorist Marshall McLuhan is quoted as saying…” the medium is the message” approx. 1963 …..and the western “news” media then took and used for the sake of their own intentions advantages ….mostly $$ by forcing opinions.

    yes Rosling did demonstrate how visualization techniques can, and do, present truths in ways which do not require ‘words’. ( not actually new at all, ancient would be a better ‘word’)

    But does that mean this will assure that information is Truth?? I don’t see/hear/feel that yet.

    Rosling;s presentation was VERY effective, first and foremost, because of his personal high level of integrity and not because of his new presentation technique. I would rather say that his creative presentation was because of that High Integrity …and that it was joined with imagination and creativity to yield a clear and powerful presentation.

    IOW Rosling demonstrated the Power behind McLuhan’s 1963 insight …where as the news media (and the Political nature of modern mind) have been demonstrating the ‘Force’ of it….and there is no sign yet that the latter wont continue and (sadly) become stronger using those same techniques.
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