Maldives
No information yet, but hang on, I’m looking for it!
Archive for month: February, 2021
Let’s try again
/in Email hitchhiking/by NielsWhen someone sent my email to two mailing lists on my way to Mozambique, I thought I struck gold. Lot’s of people will see my message and surely someone will pick me up, right? Wrong!
My email never made it onto the public mailing lists. I suppose the moderators didn’t see my message as relevant to the lists. That’s ok. In this way, email hitchhiking feels similar to regular hitchhiking. You believe you found a great spot, but end up waiting for hours for no one to even pick you up that day.
Anyway, while I was waiting, I got some time to think the concept of email hitchhiking over. In its current installment, email hitchhiking might be a bit too complicated. The project’s goal is to collect data from a variety of places and hopefully exposing some unknowns. Picking a very specific type of person to collect data from sounds fun, but feels unnecessarily hard in this early stage of the project to reach the project’s goal.
So, let’s take this bump in the road and turn it into an opportunity. I will return to a previous iteration of email hitchhiking where I simply try to hitchhike to each country in the world. An update will follow soon, so stay tuned!
Stuck in Sudan
/in Email hitchhiking/by NielsI am stuck in Sudan! Unfortunately, no one from the two mailing lists replied yet. Perhaps the moderators blocked my email, as I don’t see it on the public repository.
Anyway, I’ll wait a bit more and then see how to continue further. Perhaps I’ll send a message to one of the mailing lists myself. If that doesn’t work, I’ll try to get a new contact in Sudan and go from there.
If you know someone in Sudan who could help me out, please let me know!
From Omdurman, Sudan to two mailing lists
/in Email hitchhiking/by NielsThrough my first email, I got in touch with someone from Omdurman, Sudan who very kindly sent my email to two mailing lists. Right now, I’m waiting/hoping for some replies.
In any case, I’ve reached the African continent and while it’s still technically far to Mozambique, I’m getting (geographically) closer to Mozambique. So that’s good!
I’ve currently stayed in an English bubble and language wasn’t a problem yet. However, people in Mozambique speak a variety of languages, none of which I speak. I can manage in English, Dutch, German and French, so we’ll see how it goes.
(Hopefully) On my way to Mozambique!
/in Email hitchhiking/by NielsI just got ‘picked up’ by someone from New York City, USA! The people I sent my first email to (for privacy reasons, I won’t mention names) were so kind to forward me to someone they think can help me reach my destination in Mozambique. I’m now eagerly waiting for the reply on the second email!
Started my first email hitchhiking trip!
/in Email hitchhiking/by NielsI just sent out the first email for my email hitchhiking project! The (randomly generated) destination is: someone from Mozambique working in environment and agriculture with a vision impairment.
Will someone ‘pick me up’? Will I reach the destination? I’m not sure, but this kind of feels like real hitchhiking (minus the endless walking and the cold).
Finding data outside of my own reality bubble
/in Writings/by NielsI previously wrote about how our environments, biology and interests shape our understanding of the world. I also discussed how this understanding makes us oblivious to certain data needs for fair and safe AI systems.
This led me to wonder: how does my understanding of the world make me oblivious to certain data needs? And, more importantly, how can I become more conscious of these data needs?
Starting my own experiments
To answer the above two questions, I’m starting some of my own experiments. In these experiments, my goal is to move outside of my own reality bubble in order to encounter data I am unaware of.
I’m not quite sure yet what data I’ll explore exactly, but let’s figure that out along the way. The important part of the experiments is to get outside of my own reality bubble.
People-centered
Getting outside of my own reality bubble is not something I can do on my own. Within the field of AI, getting in touch with other people’s perspectives – either through colleagues or end-users – is essential. I will follow this tradition in my experiments.
Ultimately, my aim is to learn about other people’s realities. Obviously, I can never truly leave my own reality bubble behind.
Nonetheless, I hope my experiments give a voice to the people who’s data would otherwise not have been considered when building AI systems.
My first experiment will be Email Hitchhiking.