Reading the information on about open data made me think of the outro song “Note to self” by the hip hop artist J. Cole, when he says “you were inspired by the world, allow the world to be inspired by your s**t and use your s**t“. The artist said this because while working on his album he couldn’t clear some samples he used for his album. Although the artist said it in a derogatory manner I believe he has a point that data should be free for anyone to use. I also agree with some of the for open data arguments on wikipedia that facts cant be copyrighted because it’ll get to a point where if I write in a research paper that the sky is blue i have to give credit to someone that has copyrighted that information and thats just ridiculous. The other argument that was subtly touched upon was about how by not letting information to be accessible to the public for free, we are preventing the progression of humanity’s knowledge and advances. In the end I believe that open data should be handled the same way open source software is where the user pays the person providing the service whatever they would like if they’d like and surprisingly people do pay.
The gender gap article really surprised me, I had no idea that only 15% of publications on “public thought-leadership forums” are contributed by women. This reading sparked my to think about how women “supposedly” have equal rights in todays society but the media and upbringing of women deprives them of thinking they do have these equal rights. For example women in media women are always portrayed as a damsel in distress or in a weaker position than a man, then there are the young girls watching these things and subconsciously are being told that a man is suppose to be in a stronger position even though they can be the ones in a stronger position. Another example is how young girls are told by parents or anyone things like “thats not a girls sport”. Although with each generation the thoughts of portraying women in such a way is slowly diminishing, sexism is still alive under it all along with racism. Personally I would like to see women be more active in more “public thought-leadership forums” and support equal rights all the way!
What caught my attention in the visual and statistical thinking article was how oblivious the nasa official was to the warnings from the engineers that the Challenger was not ready for launch and they should stop the launch. Now because the nasa official didn’t heed their warning 7 people passed away. This made me realize how it is better to visually show your evidence no matter your position in an organization. Also how important it is to test out your equipment before a presentation.
