Own your own data
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Own your own data
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Re: Own your own data
#2I think this is a natural progression to the future that the industry doesn't want to happen. Best of luck to the team though and everyone else working on similar projects!
Re: Own your own data
#3THere are some exciting ideas coming out of (of all places) UK local government, looking at ways to tame the crazy number of proprietary apps that think they should own the database at the centre of their world - simply by forcing the data into the app then back again.
Re: Own your own data
#4Re: Own your own data
#5Re: Own your own data
#6I applaud all the efforts to free up and decentralize data. I believe it's the future but the way we're approaching it is making that a very distant future.
My suggestions are simple. Data ownership will not be solved by technology. Focus and practice on framing the solution in a way that people connect with. Build that into the fabric of your team. And be prepared to spend a lot of time figuring out how you can describe what a world where you own your data looks like and how it is drastically better than today's world.
It's all too easy to get caught up in writing code.
[1] https://github.com/photo/frontend
[2] https://www.shuttleworthfoundation.org/fellows/current/jaise...
Re: Own your own data
#7What we all need is to have our own personal servers that validate tokens. Then we would just give out these one-time use tokens to people or institutions. Does the bank need a SSN? Well, here is an auto-generated token. Bank stores that, but to validate it, it calls your personal little server, which checks for use.
Unfortunately, systems are built which require personal information. So eventually, for example, the government or a third party service to get credit reports needs your actual SSN. Then you are hosed.
Alternatively, all information could be free, but ALL systems would require your personal server for "permission to use." That of course is highly complicated.
The problem is everybody / every app thinks they need some piece of information. It bothers me when I go to a weekend clinic to take my son and they ask for an SSN. Why? I am going to pay you and walk out of here. "We need to send the report to your real pediatrician." well, just send it. It's not like they wont be able to file it.
I hope somebody smart comes up with a definitive solution, but a lot of processes, people's attitudes and systems need to be recreated from scratch.
Re: Own your own data
#8I've spent the last 3 years in this space[1]. 2 of those were with a fellowship from the Shuttleworth Foundation[2]. I applaud all the efforts to free up and decentralize data. I believe it's the future but the way we're approaching it is making that a very distant future. My suggestions are simple. Data ownership will not be solved by technology. Focus and practice on framing the solution in a way that people connec…
Re: Own your own data
#9Re: Own your own data
#10However, simply having a 'data store' isn't enough. You need to have a system that actually runs some infrastructure for you and then 'data collection' is an obvious side-effect. There are number of projects I'm involved with that take different approaches to this, including technical infrastructure for distributed systems and personal clouds [1,3] as well as business models and market places [2]. Systems like these can provide benefits to end-users that include resilience and flexibility -- it's not just about privacy.
[1] http://nymote.org/blog/2013/introducing-nymote/ and http://openmirage.org/wiki/overview-of-mirage