The Future of Information
Its Changing Role in Society
Ashok K. Agrawala
Director, MIND Lab
Professor, Computer Science
University of Maryland
“Information is not knowledge”
– Albert Einstein
“… the whole world is an enigma, a harmless
enigma that is made terrible by our own
mad attempt to interpret it as through it has
an underlying truth.”
– Umberto Eco
What is information??
Two Basic Entities
• Energy/Matter
• Information
Traditionally
• Information => Power
• He who has information has power
• Controlling flow of information => Controlling population
Information
• Plays a critical role in all decision making/actions
• Available Information
– Storage
• Accessible Information
– Transport and Access Methods
• Useful Information
– Selection Process – What question to ask?
• Security and Protection
Aspects of Information
• Information
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
Production/Reproduction/Collection/Recording
Storage
Transfer
Accessibility
Duplication
Security and Authentication
Trust in the authenticity
Meaning ??
• Technology has always played a key role. Its form has
been different at different times.
• Relative costs have changed substantially
Impact of changes in Costs
• Form
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Human Memory
Stone
Paper
Film
Digital
•
•
•
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Punched cards
Tapes
Cassettes
CD – DVD – CMOS
…
•
•
•
•
•
•
Production/Collection
Storage
Transfer
Accessibility
Duplication
Security and Authentication
Information
Past
• Production/Reproduction
– Human
•
•
•
•
Large Capacity
Automatic Input/Output
Unreliable Recall
Distortions –
Intentional/Unintentional
• Transfer
– People Movement
– Communication Through a
natural language
• Accessibility
– Local
• Copying/Reproduction??
• Security/Authentication
– Physical Security of
humans
• Trust in the Authenticity?
Information
Past
• Form
– Typically on paper
• Files
• Books
– Libraries/Archives
• Accessibility
– Difficult
• Filing Systems
• Catalogs
• Systematic
arrangements
• Production/Reproduction
– Handwritten
– Printed
• Duplication
– By hand
– Photocopying
– Cost ???
Information
Past
• Storage
• Accessibility
– Paper
– Catalogs
– File indexes
– …
• Handwritten
• Printed
• Books/Files/Reports/…
– Libraries
• Transfer
– Physical Movement of
Paper
• Postal System, etc.
Information
Present
• Form
– Encoded as bits, bytes,
words, records, etc.
– Stored in digital media
• Accessibility
–
–
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Through computers
Networks
Internet
Much easier
• Production/Reproduction
– Conversion from nondigital form
– Direct digital production
• Duplication
– Easy
– Inexpensive
Dissemination/Spread of
Information
• Mechanism
– Transfer
• Broadcast
– Who controls the
event and the
contents?
• Multicast
– Who can receive?
– How many?
• Unicast
– Repetition process
• Measure
– No of people consciously
aware as a function of time
Spread of information
– Decay
• Many factors
determine the time
constants
70
No of People Consciously Aware
• Media
• Web
• Phases
– Rise
80
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
Time
Spread of Information
• Rise Phase
– Triggers
• Current sensitivities
– Mechanisms
• Media
• Web
• Word of Mouth
• Decay Phase
– Authenticity ?
– Other information
competing for attention
– Time
Information Butterfly Effect !!
Controlling Butterfly Effect
• Rise Phase
– Blocking flow of
information
– Dictatorships
• Decay Phase
– Quick challenge to
authenticity
– Offer competing
information to grab
attention
Sharing of information
• Trust
• Handling conflicting
information
• Creating a consistent
view
World Wide Web
• Easy Accessibility to HUGE amount of
information
• Most of the information generated for the Web
• Broad Band Access by a large number of people
• Web servers backed up by databases of mostly
web pages
Live vs. Archived
• Live
– Collected directly in digital form
– As it happens
• Text, Audio, Video, Sensor data, …
• Archived
– Saved as collection of records
Other information
• Specific Databases
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Law Enforcement
Healthcare
Credit bureaus
Personnel Records
Census Bureau
Financial record
Telephone Records
• Hundreds of thousands of
such databases exist
• Contain a lot of data
collected as a part of
normal operation of an
entity
•
•
•
Business
Government
Private operations
• Duplication of a lot of
records with little controls
Example – Law Enforcement
• Many organizations
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–
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Federal
State
Local
Special
Private
• Sharing of information
– Exception rather than a
norm
• Attempts have been made
to create “Fusion Centers”
– Hardly successful
• Each organization
– Collects data and stores it
– Controls access to it
– Has to conforms to laws,
policies and practices
• You Don’t know what you
know
• You Don’t know what you
don’t know
Information
Future
• We are still in the
initial transient phase
of information
revolution
• Assumptions
– Unlimited availability
of
• Processing Power
• Storage
• Bandwidth
Anywhere/Anytime
Note that Human Capacity to Assimilate has not increased
Impact on Education
• Role of a Teacher
• What should we be
teaching?
• What should a student
take for granted?
– Calculator?
– Web Access?
• Ability for
– Assimilation
– Abstraction
– Cooperation
• Increased Awareness
– Changing the world
view
Impact on Society
• Social Interaction
– Cell Phones
– SMS
– Social Networks
• All Aspects are
impacted
Impact on Work Environment
• White Collar Worker/Information Worker
– Not tied to a location
– Employer optimizes ROI
– National boundaries have little meaning or impact
Impact on Politics
• National
– We are seeing some of it this year in presidential election
– What is a national interest
• Internationally
– Flow of information is making events known globally
– What is the meaning of national boundaries
Resource Constrained World
• With limited resources
– Information will play an ever increasing role
• Decisions will require a higher degree of awareness
• Cooperation rather than confrontation
Concluding Remarks
• Tip of the Iceberg
• Change is occurring faster than the society can adapt to it
• Proactive vs. Reactive Participation
• So What is information??
– That is a topic for another day
Ashok Agrawala
Agrawala@cs.umd.edu
301-405-2525
Information Butterfly Effect
80
No of People Consciously Aware
70
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50
40
30
20
10
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Time
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