How health tech platforms are transforming healthcare

Classmate Chin-Chia Liang has sent over an interesting look at health tech platforms, written by Martin Blinder, an entrepreneur in the space. The article examines how technology is altering our awareness of personal health, showing why platforms are driving some of this change. As Blinder writes,

A sleep monitoring app might tell an individual their sleep pattern is irregular, for example, but how do they understand how best to rectify this? Is it because they haven’t been exercising recently? Or perhaps it’s down to how much sugar they’ve consumed. By pulling the data together from all their devices into one place, it’s a lot easier to look at patterns and draw accurate conclusions.

That’s why I believe platforms like ours are cementing their rightful place as the next phase of progression in the health tech space. People want to understand more about what makes them tick, but they need the right tools to make sense of all the lifestyle data they generate every day.

Japan's Foray into Blockchain

Classmate Sumit Aggarwal provides a couple good looks at blockchain, each from cryptocoinsnews. The first is about Japan's digital ID for banks, and the second concerns the Japanese government's recent testing of blockchain. Here's a sample from the latter, which details the impetus behind the move to blockchain:

According to the Nikkei, the common identification platform will allow a bank account holder to register for a ‘shared ID’ which could then – as an example – be used to open another account at a different bank. The applicant would be required to provide the shared ID through a smartphone app authenticated through a fingerprint or a facial scan. Fundamentally, the shared ID would negate the need to enter, or re-enter personal information when applying for banking services at a new financial institution.

New largest number factored on a quantum device is 56,153

Classmate Alan Yan has just sent an article from phys.org that answers the question you've always wanted to answer: what's the biggest prime number ever factored? Here are some more details on this thrilling bit of research:

Researchers have set a new record for the quantum factorization of the largest number to date, 56,153, smashing the previous record of 143 that was set in 2012. They have shown that the exact same room-temperature nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) experiment used to factor 143 can actually factor an entire class of numbers, although this was not known until now. Because this computation, which is based on a minimization algorithm involving 4 qubits, does not require prior knowledge of the answer, it outperforms all implementations of Shor's algorithm to date, which do require prior knowledge of the answer. Expanding on this method, the researchers also theoretically show how the same minimization algorithm can be used to factor even larger numbers, such as 291,311, with only 6 qubits.

Good words on UBI

Classmate Torsten Walbaum has sent over a couple interesting links that focus on the universal basic income -- what merits it has and how it may be implemented. The first article is from Fortune and it summarizes the problem at hand --

A University of Oxford study from 2013 estimated that 47% of U.S. jobs may be at risk within the next two decades because of advances in artificial intelligence and automation. Last year, the White House Council of Economic Advisers estimated that workers making below $20 an hour would have an 83% chance of losing their jobs to robots in that span. Those odds dropped as workers’ education and income levels grew. But as software gets smarter, that too is subject to change: Companies will eliminate even jobs that were long considered immune from technological displacement.

... and the second piece, published by Futurism.com, is the infographic from which the banner image above it pulled.

John Oliver's take on Corporate Consolidation

Classmate Jorge Cardona has sent along the video below. It features the Last Week Tonight host's entertaining, totally-not-biased take on consolidation.

Along with the video, Jorge asks the following.

On the service part, could this deteriorated service offering end up happening to Amazon, Google, etc.? With Amazon now delivering Chipotle, Shake Shack, etc. how many other industries will they consolidate? With such power consolidation, will regulators step in? If they do, ala Standard Oil, what opportunities could be leveraged?

The Math Behind Encryption

Classmate Rachel Insoft recommends Simon Singh's book The Code Book as an introduction to the mathematics behind encryption.

Also: classmate Prem Sharma has sent over the following video, released by VC firm Andreesen Horowitz. It offers a quick primer on some of the subjects referenced in several recent classes.

The Netflix of Fashion

Classmate Rachel Moore has gone above and beyond the call of duty, sending three articles on StitchFix, the new company using machine-learning to design clothes.

Here's Quartz's version of the story and an interactive page from the company itself. Fast Company also provides a helpful backgrounder on the firm and what it's up to. See a sample below.

Here’s how Stitch Fix normally works: Customers join the site, fill out a detailed questionnaire about their size, how they like their clothing to fit, what their style is like, what colors they love and loathe, and how often they dress for certain occasions (like work, events, dates, etc.). Last year, the company introduced a Pinterest integration that lets the company learn more about what customers want. Users can create boards of images they like–which can come from any source–and algorithms analyze the assortment and feed that information into a customer’s profile. Using all that data, an algorithm then mines Stitch Fix’s inventory to find pieces that match their profile.

5 Reasons the UN Is Jumping on the Blockchain Bandwagon

Classmate Sumika Singh sent over this article, posted on Singularity Hub.

Using the Ethereum blockchain, the UN is attempting to solve some of its most pressing challenges, from refugee resettlement to food distribution. As the article notes:

The UN explains blockchain as “a distributed database that is continuously updated and verified by its users. Each added block of data is ‘chained’ and becomes part of a growing list of records, under the surveillance of network members. This technology enables the transfer of assets and the recording of transactions through a secure database.”

Defining "Decentralization"

Classmate Alan Yan provides the following article, "The Meaning of Decentralization," which was just posted on Medium. It's extensive but contains a lot of helpful sections; for example, here's a breakdown of the types of software distribution, included a few paragraphs in.

• Architectural (de)centralization — how many physical computers is a system made up of? How many of those computers can it tolerate breaking down at any single time?
• Political (de)centralization — how many individuals or organizations ultimately control the computers that the system is made up of?
• Logical (de)centralization— does the interface and data structures that the system presents and maintains look more like a single monolithic object, or an amorphous swarm? One simple heuristic is: if you cut the system in half, including both providers and users, will both halves continue to fully operate as independent units?

How to Give Debit Cards To People Without Papers

Classmate Sumit Aggarwal has just sent this interesting look at Finland and how it's using blockchain technology to give refugees a modicum of financial independence. The article, "Finland has a novel way of giving refugees money," is published by the World Economic Forum.

This thesis gives you some idea (but read the full piece to get the entire picture):

The cards mean that the refugees can also receive money – including salaries when they get jobs – and pay bills, without the need to open a bank account. 

The blockchain technology used by MONI doesn’t require a financial intermediary, such as a bank, to process transactions. Instead, transactions are instantaneous between users, and a unique digital record is kept of each one. It’s a cheaper payment system that is highly transparent.