The summer, the city, and all the civic tech your heart could desire. Here are some of the top events in the tech sector this month in NYC:
July 7
The Social and Economic Implications of Artificial Intelligence Technologies in the Near-Term
The White House and New York University’s Information Law Institute, with support from Google Open Research, Microsoft Research and the MacArthur Foundation will host a major public symposium to address the near-term impacts of AI technologies across social and economic systems.
The focus will be the challenges of the next 5-10 years, specifically addressing four themes: social inequality, labor, healthcare, and ethics. Leaders from industry, academia, and civil society will share ideas for technical design, research and policy directions.
This event will be live-streamed. Check back on July 7th for a live feed.
July 8
BetaTalk – Affordable Housing: Data, Policy, People
BetaNYC is working to build a more effective government and create empowered communities. Toward that end, this event aims to increase awareness of a particularly complicated issue: affordable housing.
Having a solid and consistent stock of affordable housing is critical to New York City’s ability to thrive economically, socially, and culturally. However, creating and preserving affordable housing is difficult given the multitude of economic factors and cultural values.
We are organizing this event to engage with neighbors familiar with affordable housing policy and with those knowledgeable about the data that can be used to inform solutions. This conversation will inform the data and technology community about how to focus efforts to best address housing problems straining communities across the city.
Note – We’re working to live stream this event.
July 9
Come and join 250 fellow geo-enthusiasts at the first ever Maps Camp on July 9th, 2016 at the UN. We’re putting together an exciting day to discuss how Open Source and the Mapping/GIS world benefit one-another.
July 10
Edible Schoolyard NYC Weekend Volunteer Day
All levels of gardeners welcome! You’ll be helping out with a variety of seasonal garden tasks, from weeding and watering to light carpentry. For safety reasons, this event is for adults only. Snacks will be provided.
July 11
Will 311 Respond to Your Call? Investigating Geographic Response Rates
Government data can often reveal surprising insights about the way communities are served. In this project, built only using open data such as weather history, census data and New York’s 311 call data, we are trying to determine wether some parts of the city were served faster than others. Then we built a model to predict – at the time of the call – if the response to it will end up late or not.
The journey from the data collection to the predictive application will cover all the different steps of a data project such as data preparation or feature engineering. Several approaches to visualize the data will also be explored. A special focus will be on how to make different technologies (SQL, python, R) work together to get the best of all worlds.
July 12
Digital Politics: New technology in motion
This month on Modern Workplace, watch Digital Politics: New technology in motion, airing July 12th at 8:00 AM PDT / 3:00 PM GMT. Get a first-hand look at some of the new tools and innovations being put to the test in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
- Stan Freck shares some of the tech innovations being used in political campaigns, including how new apps are informing an electoral process that is over 100 years old.
- Patrick Stewart discusses how data visualization is playing a crucial role in the 2016 election cycle and takes a look at some of the emerging technologies.
July 12
July 2016 NY Tech Meetup and Afterparty
Join fellow technologists for an evening of live demos from companies developing great technology in New York, followed by a networking afterparty.
July 14
How 18F Approaches Digital Strategy And Content Design
What’s important to get right when you’re designing digital services in the government? Join Ed Mullen and Nicole Fenton from 18F for two short talks and a brief workshop.
Ed will share insights about 18F’s strategy team and the role of change agents in the federal government. Nicole will share tips for working on content in an iterative, collaborative way before leading us through strategic writing exercises.
July 15
Launch: United Nations World Youth Report: Youth Civic Engagement
Join us for the launch of the UN World Youth Report on Youth Civic Engagement #YouthReport
The World Youth Report on Youth Civic Engagement explores young people’s participation in economic, political and community life, responding to growing interest in, and an increased policy focus on, youth civic engagement in recent years among Governments, young people and researchers.
The event will bring together experts, young people and Member State representatives in dialogue on how to better enable and support youth engagement in all areas.
Those unable to attend can watch the broadcast live here: www.webtv.un.org
July 28
Artist Mike Lowery has long since illustrated for kids books, magazines, galleries, and calendars. But what inspired him to throw his hat into the author ring? With the release of his new book series this past spring, Mike discusses writing and illustrating his own project, how he balances his work across many mediums (including social media sharing), and why you shouldn’t be afraid to make a mistake in your sketchbook.