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Sociotechnical Imaginaries of Big Data: Commercial Satellite Imagery and Its Promise of Speed and Transparency

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Big Data Challenges

Abstract

Geospatial Big Data is still a moving issue that is constantly contested and shaped by a multitude of actors and technological developments. Olbrich and Witjes carve out the sociotechnical imaginaries of the techno-political, analytical and security implications of geospatial Big Data development amongst the remote-sensing community. Predominantly, notions of condensed temporality and transparency permeate these visions and imagined futures. The community foresees that a constant influx of Earth observation data will replace current limits on availability and access; that epistemic practices evolve into machine–human synergies of accelerated processes of analysis; and that security policy needs to respond to a new sense of urgency as a result of increasingly predictive modes of operation.

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Olbrich, P., Witjes, N. (2016). Sociotechnical Imaginaries of Big Data: Commercial Satellite Imagery and Its Promise of Speed and Transparency. In: Bunnik, A., Cawley, A., Mulqueen, M., Zwitter, A. (eds) Big Data Challenges. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-94885-7_10

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