Swarm intelligence is a way to augment - not replace - our humanity
Interesting post here on swarm intelligence, but there's a danger in applying this concept in a disempowering way. Fundamentally, this is an empowering technological advancement that can help people cope with huge volume information in our lives, and in most cases I believe it's best used to augment --and not replace -- our humanity. I see the core concept in swarm intelligence as pervasive state awareness -- as such, there's tremendous opportunities to facilitate better, faster decisions with things like state machines. That logic can happen either at the edge or not -- depending on constraints and objectives. But rarely if ever should people be removed from the equation. Instead, the better path is to present people with recommendations that they can act on in such a manner that they can be presented with insights, and then act on those insights in a single flow of activity.
Thanks to the Trucking Nerd for the link.
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About john.mullinax
John Mullinax is a Platform Strategy Advisor with Microsoft's DPE Team. Before joining Microsoft in 2006, John held a vartiety of positions at Ford Motor Company, most recently leading IT services strategy to support explosive business growth in China. Other positions included: Enterprise Architect, Application Portfolio Management, Technology Governance, and Product Manager. Prior to joining Ford, John earned his MBA at the University of Washington. Before that, he was Director of Elections for Douglas County, Washington, where he conducted the first Federal mail-ballot election in the USA. Subsequently, he joined the Secretary of State's office as a consultant working with county election officials in Washington state to improve operational effectiveness, integrity, and security (aka, to prevent the kind of debacle we saw in Florida in 2000).
