Jeta Gjana

I think the most important takeaway from Data Science is that data really is crucial to our every day lives. This course showed me ways in which I am connected to data of which I never knew by any means. I loved learning about how data is integrated into nearly every aspect of society in some way. I would explain to a prospective student in this course that it essentially outlines how data can be used in the world. It isn’t super intricate, and is definitely a course that anyone can take on successfully as long as they pay attention and do the readings. Overall, taking this course was a positive experience.

My biggest takeaway from the course is how integral data is in our society and how important the analysis is. The class made me think of data from very different perspectives and offered ways to interpret it properly. I would advise any prospective to be more cognizant before going into the course about what exactly data is and to be aware of what it does. Many take it as a pre-requisite to MIS 2101, and I feel confident going into this course with the knowledge that I’ve gained from Data Science.

The most important takeaway from this course is whether small or not, data will always be important in some point of everyone’s life. There are so many sources for any topic, and learning to make them into visualizations was actually exciting. Most people (well, at least I did) take this data for granted, not realizing that without it, we are just living in unorganized chaos. If a MIS0855 scholar approached, I would simply say get ready to learn. I’d recommend Professor Miller as well, making sure the student ends up with the right instructor.

Before taking this course, I was ignorant of the data world. MIS 0855 taught me how vast the data world is, and how it’s transformed into daily use of information. Incoming scholars will learn how to convert raw data into presentable information that inspires knowledgeable interpretations.

The most important thing I took from this course was that data is everywhere, and that if you look hard enough, you will find meaning in it. I never considered before how much data is made and kept daily before today, nor did I really understand what MIS could do. I would tell a future MIS scholar that this course is about learning to think factually, and visualize data. I’d warn them that they may end up an MIS major by the end of it.

My most important takeaway is my sense of appreciation for data as an asset. Through this course, I have learned new methods to analyze and play around with data. It’s so much more interesting than I expected. If I explained this course to other students, I would say it is an exciting class about data that can help you in real life.

The most important takeaway from the class is the vast amounts of things that can be done using data. I was able to use material that I learned in this class and apply them to my job. In doing so, I really felt as if I added value to the company using the education I learned in this class. I will be able to use some of the knowledge that I learned in this course consistently at my job and that is by far the most important takeaway from the class.

I believe the most important take-away from this class is that data is constantly getting bigger, and collected at a faster rate, and that this will continue into the future, making for a heavy demand for MIS professionals in the business world to be able to deal with this data and for them to be able to turn that data into actionable knowledge. This class really made me realize how intimately integrated data is into almost everything we do in our daily lives, in ways we may have never before imagined. I would tell a future student in this class that it was about learning how to harness the power of the data that is all around us to be able to turn it into something insightful and of value to the business and educational world, as well as studying principles of data visualization in order to make presentations more impactful.

The most important thing I learn from this course is recognizing how often we interact with data in our daily lives. The course also introduced a variety of useful programs and tools such as Tableau, Excel, and Piktochart to understand, analyze and display data. I would say that MIS 0855 is a very enjoyable and informative course which gives us basic understanding of data; it is helpful and relevant for everyone regardless of their major.

The most important takeaway from this course is understanding the importance of data, and data is everywhere in people’s’ daily life. By analysing data, people can get a lot of informations from it. For example, the way that insurance companies use to adjust customers’ premiums. If I had to explain to a future MIS0855 scholar what this course was about, I would say that this course let you know how this world is surrounded by data, and how useful the data is.

From my perspective the most important takeaway from this course was the usage of Tableau. I’ll be using it all summer and the exposure to it in this class was super helpful. Understanding the ways in which we can describe data through visualizations, how to represent that data, as well as manipulate it to be seen in the desired way.

The most valuable thing I learned throughout the class is the amount of application that data science brings to businesses. I never realized how valuable KPI’s and Visualizations could be to businesses, as an accurate system to get feedback on products and practices. If I were to explain the course to a scholar, I’d say we analyze data from everywhere, create graphics to visualize it, and strategically adjust practices based on the data.

The biggest takeaway from this course is how we can regcognize how data is a daily party of our lives. In addition, we get to use Tableau to make data visualization instead of just using Excel. For future scholars, I would say this course will help you to identify and analyze data in many ways. Seeing as how big data is such a current thing, this class will give you an idea of what is big data and possibly provide useful lessons in using this for real life situation.

The most important thing to take away from this class is how data comes into play in our lives everyday and how it will be sufficient to know the in’s and out’s of data for our future jobs. I would explain to a future MIS0855 student that this class is crucial in order to learn how to work with different kinds of data and how it can be useful when it comes to decision making inferences.

The subject of our group project is the research of population and ownership of pets (specifically dogs and cats) to suggest development strategies for pet care companies.
Our team has Ngoc-Tran Tran, Arlo Ante, Nhan H Nguyen, Jiayue Zhu and Ngoc Pham.

Our team is working on determining the relationship between high school drop-out rates, household incomes and crime rates in different districts in Philadelphia.

Our team consists of:
– Qisheng Chen.
– Erin R. Kearney
– Heshuo Zhang
– Yi Xuan Zhou
– Linh H. Dang (me)

Our team will present the Rise and Decline of Kobe Bryant. Our team has Kevin Bradley, Korah Sabu, Nate Tomcho, Stanley John, and Christopher Jackson

Our team is using 2013 MLB baseball statistics to find out which teams and players performed the best. We also are using the statistics to identify which positions have the highest and lowest batting averages.

James Dantonio
Anthony Brusco
Michael Murray
John Barone

One thing that my internship has taught me so far that I definitely did not learn in the classroom is that it is better to build relationships with your co-workers that are more than just professional. I have learned that everyone on my time is just a grown up college kid and do not want to always focus on work. They have showed me that is is important to take breaks form work and talk about things like weekend plans and beer. Going into my internship I thought I would be in a strict environment where work is the primary focus at all times. I was very surprised to find that my work environment is more about getting along with everyone and having a good time.

I have acquired many soft skills through my internship that I otherwise would not have in my classes. My boss has consistently reiterated how important it is to leave a good impression on everyone that I interact with in any corporate or professional setting. This includes a firm handshake, active and attentive participation in meetings, and communicating effectively with many different personalities in mind. I have also learned the importance of asking questions to fully understand project objectives, in order to provide my boss with exactly what was requested, and more.

In my internship, I’ve learned that most projects in real life do not adhere to a syllabus. There have been days where I was told to do something, and then told the next day that I should wait a couple of weeks to get used to it.

I’ve also learned that things are not always fair. In my classes, my grades reflect my work; I have a lot of control. In work, I sometimes see my peers work hard and go unnoticed. The level of their work does not always reflect the levels of praise or accolades they receive.

I have learned a lot about the personalities of different types and stages of professionals. Business is not always objective. HR does not always follow up when they say they will. Nothing will ever be handed to you. It is important to always be attentive and to form good, healthy relationships with those you work with and for if you want to succeed.

The first lesson I learned is that networking is key. Finding a job is much easier when you have built a strong network. Anywhere you go with your career, particularly in the business world, is impacted by your network.

The second lesson I learned is that I am ready to do the work needed. At school, you spend so much time learning new material and getting graded on your knowledge that you feel that there are gaps in your understanding. Covering such a wide breadth of new materials consistently while being told about all the possibilities out there is overwhelming. When you start an internship and you learn one function or a few tasks at a time, it makes you realize that you are ready for the workforce. Of course, not being graded makes it less stressful although then you have to self-regulate to make sure that your deliverables are high-quality.

Besides learning some technical skills from my internship, I have learned that your co-workers want you to succeed. You have to build relationships with each one to understand them. You have to make important connections in your networks that can help you land a job over someone who doesn’t know anybody. Networking and being able to understand people’s background are skills that I learned. Another lesson I learned from my manager was always keep a suit jacket near your office. There may be times where executives may want to speak with you and you need to look your best. And lastly, the most important lesson is always try and be the best. Everyone is watching you and they will note how late you stay or how attentive you are when doing assigned jobs.

During my internship, I have learned that building close relationships with my co-workers is really important. Whenever I had a question and my manager was busy, I would have to rely on those who sat around me for help. If I did not make an effort to get to know my co-workers, I could not have gotten help from them as easily as I did, so the importance of building relationships is something I learned from this internship. Building relationships is also great because all of my co-workers were extremely helpful so they often told me the in’s and out’s of the company. This allowed me to understand and get to know the company a lot better.

In my internship, I’ve learned to incredible importance of properly taking initiative when given a task to complete, either as an individual or as a member of a team. When you make a commitment to your employer, it is key to follow through on that commitment. Your credibility will take a huge hit if you do not complete a task within a specified period of time, and your superiors will think differently of you from that point on, unless you do something to improve your credibility going forward. And, when working on a team, it is important to manage taking initiative with being a team player. No one wants a member of their team to dominate conversation, because it will make them reluctant to contribute to the project as a whole.

Something you can’t learn in class that I’ve learned throughout my internship experience is the power of networking. In class they teach us if you want a certain job you need to have a certain GPA, a certain Degree, and a certain skill set. However, that isn’t always going to be enough to get you where you want to go. Through strong networking alone someone who might not be as qualified for a task or job might end up in that position just because they know someone who will vouch for them or because they have a relationship with the person looking to fill the position. With the internet, LinkedIn, and social media the world has become a smaller place so you’ll be surprised to find out who knows who and who can help advance your professional career.

During my internship, there were quite a few lessons and tips that I learned that I wouldn’t have learned in the classroom or from a textbook. One such lesson is the ability to establish effective relationships with your coworkers. Simply getting to know someone and their “story” can go a far way in developing a healthy work relationship. Knowing who you work with can be very helpful when you need some assistance with a task or assignment. Another important lesson I learned was to always take pride in fulfilling a duty or task, no matter how small. It’s not the size of the task that matters but how you go about completing it. Lastly, I learned the importance of offering to be involved. Being helpful to others can go a far way when it’s reciprocated in a time when you really need it.

One of the greatest lessons i have learned during my internships with Comcast is that ” Your network is your net worth.” As an intern, it is absolutely necessary to build effective relationships in the workplace. Not only to familiarize yourself with the team or organization but to have a team of people on your side when conversion opportunities are on the table. It is important to be present and visible within a company so that people can put a name to face when they see your resume come on their desk. I have also learned that its important to document your processes for completing different tasks. In previous internships, I would pull and manipulate the same reports. My tasks became very repetitive and seemed like second nature after a while. However, in this internship, i am working on different projects every week, so it is very important to document processes and procedures so that superiors do not have to repeat themselves.

One lesson I learned is that projects get put on hold frequently and what you’re currently working on may change the next day. In class, we have assignments with due dates that have been planned in advance. Those due dates may change depending on the professor, however they usually remain consistent. In my internship, there are many ad hoc projects that could be due that day or maybe a week later. Also, projects that I’ve been working on for a week could suddenly get delayed. So many aspects could cause this, such as a hold on the budget or a manager deciding to go another way. There’s so much change within an organization that it can be tough to know what your day-to-day activities will be.

There are many things that I have learned from my experience at my internship that I could not learn in the classroom. One of the biggest was simply learning how to work in a professional environment and with my co-workers. Since most of my work has been done either in a group setting or one on one with my supervisor, learning to deal with people in the work setting came quickly. As others wrote about, a lot of it comes down to the individual’s personality and your relationship with them. These experiences have taught me a great deal on the casual and professional side of socializing in a work environment.

Three things that my internship has taught me so far that I definitely did not learn in the classroom. One is that I have to understand different personality types. Some of my co-workers are more serious. They are just doing their job. They do not want to talk about personal life, share some interests from themselves or make a joke. Some co-workers are more easy-going person. They want to talk about these things. The other lesson I learned is that always asking your supervisor about what something else I could help after you have done your work. Don’t wait someone ask you about do you done your job. It has to be show more motive. Besides, I also learned that managers always watch you even if you don’t realize that. They may not tell you what your performance in that time, but they still know whether you are doing your work.

at my internship one lesson I learned was that taking responsibility for your own mistakes and taking the proper time to learn and correct them can show a great deal to your employers about who you are. At the beginning of my 2nd internship I was often missing important things within my referrals that the sales team could have used as leverage to help close customers. I could have blamed it on improper training or something but owned up to my own mistakes and began studying the more senior employees notes to see where I could improve. The fact that I took responsibility for my mistakes and made strides to fix them myself I could tell was something my boss and my team responded. receiving my first spark(instant message) from my boss saying “good note Tyler” was one of the best feelings ever because I knew I had finally made it over that learning curve I was experiencing in the beginning and it wasn’t going unrecognized. Taking pride and responsibility for your work can go a long way.

One thing that I’ve learned in my internship is to have a balance between your work life and personal life. An older and really great person I worked with gave me advice about work and life in general. One of the many great advice he gave me was to not overwork yourself to the point where you make work your only life. It’s important to over achieve in your career but when it interferes with your work, then it becomes a problem. He told me how he used to come to work even on weekends and stay there all day and it affected his family and personal life. This is one of many things I’ve learned that I couldn’t learn in the classroom.

One thing that I learned during my internship that I couldn’t learn in a textbook or the classroom was to keep a good balance between work and my time to myself. Having a good balance between both have been very vital. When I was over worked at time I saw that I was less productive in what I was doing. But when I had a good mix of the two it made it easier to do work. Also, I learned how to work with different types of people during my internship. Everyone works differently and sometimes you need to adapt to how others are to work more efficiently with them. I saw that for some people I needed to be more personable with them in order to make sure the do what they needed to and some always got their work done in time to hand over to me. Having that ability to adapt is key to succeeding in the workforce because things never work out just the way you want them to and you need to be able to work with what you are given.

I would say one of the big lessons I learned was project management in a working environment (rather than academic environment). As a student our group projects a typically short term projects, deadlines are very firm, group members can meet at almost any time (especially in the late evening), and usually your project is one of their top priorities as well because they want a good grade. In the working world this can be a lot different. Over the course of my internship I had some projects than spanned just a couple months, and others I took part in that were a multi-year project. Something I quickly realized was that while project teams will try to abide by the deadline set forth originally, it is often more of a guideline and these deadlines may change significantly when roadblocks come up, or when another project takes priority. It can also be difficult to fit meetings into the day. At school I am used to being able to hold a meeting before classes, between classes, and most often after classes are ended for the day. At work however I was confined to the 9 to 5 range, give or take. Everyone worked a full day but while some people stayed working until 6 pm, others would leave by 3 or 4. The final difference I learned was how a project is prioritized. In school almost all projects have similar priority levels. At work however it depended on each individual members workload aside from the project, their typical day to day duties, and the size of their role in the project. The members with the biggest roles were most motivated and had the project as a top priority. It was the people with smaller roles or our liaisons that we often had to give an extra push to get what we needed from them in a manner consistent with our timeline. These are all things that while someone could have told me in a classroom setting or in a textbook, it is not something I really understood until I was in the working world environment myself.

From my internship, I learned the responsibility attached to a job. If you miss school, or don’t do your work at school, it’s all on you. At a job or internship, other people are counting on you to be there and take responsibility for your tasks. Sometimes, it’s not only the company or your boss that is counting on you; clients or customers might be counting on you as well. Also, the responsibility of the work your produce is now real. In school, all of the papers and projects are simulations of work. At a job or internship, the work you produce is ultimately serving a purpose and can impact the company negatively or positively. As simple as that is, you just can’t learn this in the classroom or from a textbook.

Amazon.com product reviews reviews. Each row would be a review of a product.

Column 1 – Name of Product
Column 2 – Purchase Date
Column 3 – Numeric or Star based rating
Column 4 – Description of their review
Column 5 – Would you recommend to a friend? Yes or No
Column 6 – Name of Reviewer

I work at a recruiting firm, and we use a database called PCRecruiter. The rows would be the names of each individual candidate that we could potentially contact. The columns would have data such as the individuals’ phone number, email address, the city where they live, and their compensation. It would make viewing this data much more concrete and much simpler for a visual learner.

A data-driven service that I regularly use is Blackboard. This is a perfect example since I use it everyday. If the data was stored in a spreadsheet, the rows would be all the classes I take. The columns would consist of the professor’s name, the semester the class was taken, exam grades, time of class, etc.

One data-driven service I use multiple times daily is Facebook. Facebook stores many kinds of data, but one example of the data it contains is the data that appears on one’s profile. The row would be the person, potentially identified by a number so that if they changed their name it could be fixed in the relational database where number is translated to name. Some columns would be name, age, gender, birthday, and workplace.

I use Facebook almost everyday.
A row will be an individual post.
Some of the columns would be:
– Date (MM/DD/YYYY)
– Number of likes.
– Number of comments.
– Number of shares.
– Type of post (pictures, textual statuses, videos, or shares)
– Number of words in the post.
– …

I visit the website HotNewHipHop regularly because they review the newest Hip-Hop and R&B music. To keep it organized, I can use the rows for the individual song and album/mixtape reviews. The columns would be the name of the artist and their song, percentage number of “thumbs up” and “thumbs down” for each song, news stories, playlists, and even videos. By doing this, I can keep all information easy to access.

A data-driven service that I frequently use is PNC Bank’s Online Banking website, sometimes referred to as the “virtual wallet,” to check how much I am spending and how much money is periodically deposited and withdrawn from my account.

Rows would include: the time and setting of transactions, how much money was transacted
Columns would include: each month, total balance

Facebook: for fan page management. Each row would represent the statistics regarding the website for the page admin to understand how his/her page is doing
(1)Name of the site
(2)Number of likes
(3)Number of comments
(4)Number of shares
(5)Traffic rate (number of people visiting the page every day)
(6)Response rate (of the website admin)

As a big sports fan, I tend to follow who the best performers are in the NBA. The statistics of players could easily be represented in an Excel sheet. Each row would represent a different players statistics. The first column would include the player’s name, and then show their points per game, rebounds per game, assists per game, etc. You could then use the filter option in Excel to see who the top performers are in each category.

For Amazon.com I could see the spreadsheet being composed by order numbers with.
So column1 would include order number then there would be a sub column for each product in the order (product id number) then the row would consist of product name, quantity, user id, account id.

A data-driven service that I use regularly is BlackBoard. The row would be the courses that I am talking. The columns would be the due date, grades, new announcements, instructors, and the year of the class.

http://priceonomics.com/what-death-row-inmates-say-in-their-last-words/

This is a very interesting article about the statistics of the people who are on death row, specifically their last words. It’s a very sad and touchy topic to see what these people are saying on their last words, but even if they do the most horrific crime, you can see they are all humans at the end of the day. The fact that love is used 62% of the time, that really shows that people, as unforgiving their actions are, have true feelings, also.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/patients-scientists-fight-over-research-data-access-1457394712
Last semester I finished my minor by taking a class on the Biopharmaceutical industry and is something I find very interesting and controversial. This article talks about the issues dealing with making patient research data more widely available to the public as open data. The problem here is that not everyone agrees with this being open for the public. There is also a concern that other researches may use this data against the research and to try and prove it wrong. Deciding how access to this research should be given out is very crucial as it could help with the process of drug development but could also hinder the researches and patients within the studies.

Crooks Steal, Sell Verizon Enterprise Customer Data

The link above discusses the recent data breach experienced by Verizon. Recently, concepts such as these have become more and more interesting to me because I find it so fascinating that a few people with enough motivation and malicious intent have the ability to have such a negative impact on individuals and a corporation in general. The fallout for Verizon will probably be similar to those data breaches of Target and Home Depot, and I’m curious to see how Verizon responds.

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/michigan-state-and-the-biggest-ncaa-tournament-upsets-ever/
For the last couple of weeks, the March Madness college basketball tournament has been in full swing. This year, there have been quite a few improbable upsets of some of college’s best teams. In the first round of the tournament, 2 seed Michigan State lost to 15 seed Middle Tennessee. With just a 5.5% chance to win the game, Middle Tennessee shocked the college basketball world by defeating one of the few teams that experts selected would win it all. This victory for Middle Tennessee ranked as the third biggest upset in March Madness since 1985. Although Michigan State had the second highest percentage of any team to win the championship, they were unfortunately knocked out in round one by a big surprise.

http://arstechnica.com/business/2016/03/dell-to-sell-perot-systems-unit-to-ntt-data-at-loss-of-800-million/

This article is about Dell selling its subsidiary IT company, Dell Services to Perot systems, which was don in attempt to raise capital for Dell’s acquisition of ENC. Basically, NTT data happily acquired Dell services, because the company is known for its outstanding infrastructure, cloud, application, and people outsourcing services, and its great overall reputation. Dell, on the other hand, will be gaining an expansion in technological resources and and a network of 230 data centers that are operated by NTT.

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-ncaa-tournaments-most-where-the-hell-is-that-college-colleges-ranked/
This article discusses data that FiveThirtyEight collected through the use of a google form. They asked readers to identify the states that the teams playing in the NCAA tournament were located in. Among schools whose names did not directly indicate the state that they reside in, Temple had the 4th highest percentage as 85% correctly answered that Temple is located in Pennsylvania. This article made me ponder the factors that could influence the results including marketing done by schools or prestige of the schools. Overall, I found this article interesting because I enjoy sports and it was nice to see the results for Temple.

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/trump-will-have-a-hard-time-turning-blue-states-red-in-november/

In this article, a deep analysis of the presidential election is given in terms of Trump’s realistic chances of becoming president. For the most part, it shows the percentages of Trump’s followers and what state he has been able to “win.” There were a lot, however Trump is “deeply unpopular with general election voters.” In other words, winning a couple states is not exactly guaranteeing him a seat in the White House. He actually might end up doing the opposite, almost forcing people to vote for the Democratic party instead. Numbers do lie sometimes.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2015/09/08/4-ways-big-data-will-change-every-business/2/#5797d08671b5

This article outlines how big data can impact and help any business, regardless of size. It is quite important to point out that some businesses think that big data is not relevant or needed for them, yet it can be used by nearly any business in order to improve in many ways. Firstly it helps increase efficiency and accuracy of information used by the workers in the company. Furthermore, it can help enhance the customer experience by viewing trends and other useful data aspects. It is becoming more clear every year that big data could be the future of business efficiency.

http://espn.go.com/sports/endurance/story/_/id/15090507/endurance-sports-bobbi-gibb-first-woman-run-boston-marathon
This article is unbelievable. It tells the story of the first woman to qualify for the Boston Marathon and how she had to break the rules to do so. Courageous and inspirational Bobbi Gibb began a trend for other women to do the same and run marathons alongside her, even when women were told they weren’t “psychologically” capable and highly discouraged. This is incredible to me personally because I ran my first marathon this year and it was one of the best experiences of my life. The article relates to data because of the times listed to qualify for bigger races and how incredible it was that a woman crushed them!

http://www.wsj.com/articles/is-technology-making-people-less-sociable-1431093491
This article talks about 2 different perspectives, which are social media makes us less sociable and social media does not make us less sociable. The article interests me by its topic and the actual statistics that it provides. Particularly, throughout of the article, I have known that 71% of adults in the U.S uses Facebook, 28% uses LinkedIn, 28% uses Pinterest, 26% uses Instagram and 23% uses Twitter.

Apple’s next big problem: figuring out how the FBI hacked its iPhone

One of my favorite topics right now is the FBI vs Apple case. This is very interesting to me, because it deals with the division between government and the private sector. This article talks about how the FBI cracked the encryption on the Apple phone and now Apple is scrambling to figure out how they did it. A little bit more background the phone belonged to a terrorist and Apple was ordered to crack the encryption on the phone for the FBI, but Apple refused.

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/significant-digits-for-wednesday-march-23-2016/
This article is interesting because it gives you groups of significant digits that have their meaning on a particular day. The numbers they give represent the most latest and interesting data around you. For example, 50 trillion means “Scientists were able to catch two stars — KSN 2011a and KSN 2011d — exploding, but did so by monitoring light every 30 minutes for three years from a field of 500 galaxies comprised of 50 trillion stars.” on that day. What is more, if you are interested in that number, you can click the link at the end of its summary and it will lead you to the website.

http://news.discovery.com/space/astronomy/galaxy-map-here-are-the-milky-ways-red-dwarfs-160328.htm
I didn’t find this article about the Milky Way’s red dwarfs to be particularly interesting, however, it did include a map of the location of the red dwarfs which I think served as a great data visualization.

This article dives into Apple’s newest technological innovation “Night Mode.” Night Mode is a new feature of the iOS operating system that changes the color of the light emitted by iPads and iPhones as evening falls. This ultimately makes it easier for users to fall asleep at night; the light transitions into a duller, warmer light that results in users feeling more “sleepy.” As an iPhone user, I found this article very interesting. Most, if not all, iPhone users, even Apple product users for that matter, are glued to their device while on the verge of slumber. The fact that Apple created this feature is ingenious because users will now be more likely to fall asleep quicker, ultimately aiding in a better night’s sleep.

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/apples-new-night-mode-doesnt-mean-you-should-take-your-tablet-to-bed/

This article is interesting as I can relate it to the material that we learned in class about FitBit and how data from apps can help us improve our health. From this article, I realize that as humans, we don’t always open up our problems to our friends or family because of shame and other things. We are more honest to apps on our phone, ranting about something that is bothering you on twitter instead of talking to friends to let it out, for example. I see that this is a good thing as the article says that the data collected by the apps can be put to good use. However, I’m afraid that one day, these apps will take over our social life and our social skills will become worse. This is why sometimes I feel that we are more communicated with social apps and internet, but somehow our communicating skills are worsen and that isn’t a good thing. There are pros but there are also bad effects of this big data phenomenon. I hope we can make good use of the pros but also find ways to reduce the bad impacts that it have on us.

https://datafloq.com/read/how-social-media-companies-use-big-data/1957
According to this article, social media companies like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, hold a large body of data thanks to their nature of personal-level interaction with their users. Data at the disposal of these companies, such as likes, shares, follows, comments, retweets, click-through rates of URLs embeds, gives invaluable information about what individuals and societies hold important. This information is particularly useful for companies to analyze markets and predict consumer behavior, making it a driving factor behind every marketing decision.

http://www.theguardian.com/fashion/shortcuts/2016/mar/29/rise-blackout-tattoo-trend-internet
This article is about covering tattoos. And I am interested in this because I have a tattoo, but I really hope I don’t. I want to know how people deal with tattoos that they don’t like any more. To be honest, “blackout tattoo” sounds terrible to me. I want to know some more details about how they feelings about blackout the tattoos. Because people may be regretted just as their felt to the original tattoos. This make me want to find more datas about relevant information.

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/a-baseball-mystery-the-home-run-is-back-and-no-one-knows-why/

What I found interesting about this topic is the fact that the number of home runs, velocity after contact, and percentage of home runs hit has jumped to its highest point in five years, but has no explanation behind it. Although there are many theories behind the cause of a spike as such, several tests have been conducted, and each has come back inconclusive. Unable to find a definitive answer as to why there has been such a jump, and as it continues through spring training this year, we will have to see if the trend ends during the regular season or if it continues further this year.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/mar/30/lululemon-annual-sales-yoga-pants

This article is about the company ‘Lululemon’ and how today they reported annual sales of more than two billion dollars. This is a huge increase from last year and they predict sales will double to four billion in another year with their shares climbing on Wall Street. I found this article interesting for a few reasons, one being that the financial successes of this company just came two years after the company was plunged into a crisis by an “unacceptable level of sheerness”. They withdrew 17% of their stock and their CPO resigned after that. I also found this article interesting because I am really interested in the business side of fashion, whether it’s managing finances for a fashion company or running it, both have me intrigued.

http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/mar/30/clean-streets-mobile-laundry-service-australia-homeless-orange-sky
This article talks about that a few people in Australia start to provides free laundry service out of a van to homeless people. This service involved in almost about 500 volunteers. I think it is interesting because I think these people are amazing about the way they help homeless people. They really wanted to help homeless and thinks for homeless people from details like laundry services.

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/datablog/2016/jan/18/young-fear-jobs-automated-10-years-report
This article is about young people who are concerned that jobs will be automated within the next decade. A poll was conducted in nine countries asked people between the ages of 16 and 25 to rate their confidence in their technological skill. In the United States, only 51% of males and 42% of females were confident in their IT skills. This is an interesting and relevant to me seeing as how I fall into the age range along with how advance technology is becoming to the point where I might also be concern if my future job will no longer require a person.

http://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/datablog/2016/jan/21/the-schools-that-topped-the-2015-gcse-league-table-by-region

This article compares by region, the top schools in England that have the highest scoring General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) scores. Since we are currently learning about databases and excel, it is interesting to see real-word examples of databases being utilized by research in this specific article. It is also interesting to see how more religious schools in England are out ranking out the general public schools.

http://www.computerworld.com/article/3050022/apple-ios/ios-9-3-is-apple-s-most-stable-ios-yet-data-claims.html
This article looks at the crash rates and statistics behind apple’s newest operations program. Considering we are currently using visualizations, this article is relevant and reminded me of our last assignment.