Databases. They’re not just for those with specialized skills anymore. Want to know what kinds of insights into the world everyday people can find when the right tools are available to process plenty of data? Check out this example below.
One year ago we wrote about a fascinating service called PolicyMap, a website where users can view more than 4000 different data sets laid out on a map down to the city street level. I found which parts of my neighborhood donated more money to John McCain than to Barack Obama, and vice versa. Today PolicyMap launched a new feature for subscribers that allows up to three points of data to be cross-referenced. You may or may not be interested in subscribing to PolicyMap, but anyone can see from the screencast below just how much potential technologies like this have.
There’s a button to view this video full screen in the bottom-right corner of the player.
This is pretty interesting stuff, is it not? The ability to cross-reference different sets of data with factors like geographic location is really exciting. Extrapolate from this, if you will, by imagining what kind of things could be made possible if programmatic access to data from Facebook could be layered into systems like this. Or any other large data set that’s hording it. Anonymous aggregate data made available to developers who can build interfaces that allow end users to analyze that data is likely to be an even more important resource in the near future than it is today.
