New Data on Networks

I have to pass on one more item from Harvard's Social Science Statistics Blog. The article -- "How Do You Get 7,000,000 Cell Phone Records?" -- discussed this presentation by David Lazer.

Wow.

We've been talking about big numbers and new data sources and using traditional data in new ways and even using cell phones as data sources, but this goes way beyond.

Beyond beyond.

How about using the records of 7,000,000 cell phone users (including 49 trillion conversations!) to map social networks? What if you then followed up that work by tracking (participating) students for a month, paying attention to both phone conversations and physical proximity -- and used that data as a predictor of friendship patterns? What if you took that research next to Washington?

Amazing information that you need to check out, if only to put our community work and local indicator projects in context with the possible.