Discussion: Humans As Sensors

Brady Forrest is Program Chair for O’Reilly’s Where and co-chair for Android Open . Additionally, he co-chaired the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco and NYC. Brady writes for O’Reilly Radar tracking changes in technology. He previously worked at Microsoft on Live Search (he came to Microsoft when it acquired MongoMusic). Brady lives in Seattle, where he builds cars for Burning Man and runs Ignite. You can track his web travels at Truffle Honey.

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Markus Tripp is manager business development at Mobilizy. He is responsible for the content eco system and search technology for the Wikitude world browser. Additionally he developed Wikitude.me the social web interface to Wikitude. Markus is also founder and CTO of Netociety, a company that develops a wiki like social enterprise system using HTML5 technology.

Previously, Markus worked for Sony in Austria and Germany, where he was leading software architect of the music download and streaming server platforms Connect Europe and StreamMan (Vodafone music). Prior to that he lead a team to develop solutions for the MHP (multimedia home platform).

Markus studied computer science at the University of Salzburg and as an Austrian he loves to ski in winter.

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Deborah Estrin, PhD, is Professor of Computer Science at UCLA, and co-Director of a new non-profit, openmhealth.org. Estrin is known as a thought leader in the innovative application of wireless and mobile technologies. Ongoing projects include self-monitoring applications in support of health and wellness and Participatory Sensing campaigns for community data gathering, citizen science, and STEM education in her career, she was an active member of the Internet research and open standards community. Estrin is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

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Sharon is a co-founder and the Chief Operating Officer at Path Intelligence. She is responsible for strategy and product development and has assisted Path Intelligence to develop their two flagship products FootPath and QPath.

Sharon is originally from New Zealand but completed her MBA at MIT where she became exposed to the idea of ‘reality mining’. Sharon and her co-founders saw the potential in marrying the techniques being developed in the reality mining space with the innovations and flexibility of another great MIT idea, software defined radio on off-the-shelf hardware.

Path Intelligence today utilise open-source software defined radio to detect RF signals from GSM phones, sensing and collecting anonymous data across all networks but without relying on the mobile networks to provide that data. They are installed throughout the UK where their technology is primarily used to assist shopping malls, retailers and airports enhance their offering to consumers. The firm has been recognised for its innovation and technology leadership through various awards and has been featured regularly in the media including on the BBC, CNN and most recently in the Christmas 2008 edition of The Economist.

Sharon has an MBA degree from MIT, an MA in Economics and a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Auckland, New Zealand.

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Di-Ann lives in Palo Alto, by way of Portland, OR, Boston, NYC and Amsterdam. Di-Ann is a neogeography pioneer and serial entrepreneur employing all means to increase the world’s citizen mappers. Di-Ann functions as both Chairman of Platial <http: />, The People’s Atlas, and as VP Community Geographer at Waze <http: />. Waze is free crowd-sourced navigation and real-time traffic. Started in Israel and well past critical mass, Waze now has top quality map, navigation and traffic data in the country. Di-Ann is setting up US operations and crafting the cartography of “live mapping”.

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