SIERRA SIEMERDirected Research

CHAPTER TWO:Innovations

ALPHABETBy the 27th c. BCE Egyptian writing had a set of 24 hieroglyphs

EYE GLASSESDates back to ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs in the 5th century BC

PHOTOCOPIERFirst widely used copy machine was invented in 1779

THE PILLFirst approved for contraceptive use in the US in 1960

This thesis presents the hypo thesis that data aggregation, when used by advertisers, leads to self-fulfilling prophecies and furthers harmful ste-reotypes. New marketing techniques that mine our personal information present us with advertisements based on habits of people whose likes and dislikes are similar to ours. These assumptions, for example that a person in a low-income community will be interested in trade school, lower a community’s potential and attempt to create unnecessary cul-tural assimilation. When using free media channels, it is essential to realize that the product is the audience, and consumers are corporate advertisers. Such a hypothesis could lead to more accountability from corporations, or restructure how this information is used. What if data mining were used to raise up our communities rather than keep them at status quo?

HYPOTHESIS