Google Flu Trends Gets It Wrong Three Years Running 64
wabrandsma writes with this story from NewScientist: "Google may be a master at data wrangling, but one of its products has been making bogus data-driven predictions. A study of Google's much-hyped flu tracker has consistently overestimated flu cases in the US for years. It's a failure that highlights the danger of relying on big data technologies.
Evan Selinger, a technology ethicist at Rochester Institute of Technology in New York, says Google Flu's failures hint at a larger problem with the algorithmic approach taken by technology companies to deliver services we all want to use. The problem is with the assumption that either the data that is gathered about us, or the algorithms used to process it, are neutral. Google Flu Trends has been discussed at slashdot before: When Google Got Flu Wrong."
Evan Selinger, a technology ethicist at Rochester Institute of Technology in New York, says Google Flu's failures hint at a larger problem with the algorithmic approach taken by technology companies to deliver services we all want to use. The problem is with the assumption that either the data that is gathered about us, or the algorithms used to process it, are neutral. Google Flu Trends has been discussed at slashdot before: When Google Got Flu Wrong."
Tweak the Algorithms (Score:4, Funny)
Learn from nature! Google needs a genetic algorithm that modifies itself every flu season.
The fittest algorithm will survive to infect thousands.