We all know success stories where the algorithm is the decisive factor for these 3 companies to be the leaders in their sector, despite not having infrastructure:
- Uber: the largest transport company in the world, which does not have 1 single transport.
- Whatsapp: does not have telecommunications infrastructure, but sends 35 BILLION messages a day.
- Alibaba: it is the second most profitable retailer in the world, although it does not even have inventories.
What do these three companies have in common? The use of algorithms to disrupt the industry.
We know of other successful examples in the use of algorithms, such as Google’s search engine, which is constantly updated, or Facebook.
However, some specialists stress the importance of being careful with the algorithms, considering that they are not equitable “since it is the person who creates them that defines their functioning and their results”. So says researcher Cathy O’Neil in his book Weapons of Math Destruction (we found it very fun and creative to change Math – mathematics – by Mass-masivo – in the title).
Current technological trends like Machine learning are leading us to use algorithms more and more. Will the time come when we blindly rely on decisions based on algorithms? What do you think?
