Data scientists at work /

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Bibliographic Details
Author / Creator:Gutierrez, Sebastian, author.
Imprint:[Berkeley, CA?] : Apress, [2014]
New York, NY : Distributed to the Book trade worldwide by Springer
©2014
Description:1 online resource (xi, 364 pages) : illustrations
Language:English
Subject:
Format: E-Resource Book
URL for this record:http://pi.lib.uchicago.edu/1001/cat/bib/11090894
Hidden Bibliographic Details
ISBN:9781430265993
143026599X
9781430265986
1430265981
Notes:Includes bibliographical references and index.
Online resource; title from PDF title page (SpringerLink, viewed December 22, 2014).
Summary:Data Scientists at Work is a collection of interviews with sixteen of the world's most influential and innovative data scientists from across the spectrum of this hot new profession. "Data scientist is the sexiest job in the 21st century," according to the Harvard Business Review. By 2018, the United States will experience a shortage of 190,000 skilled data scientists, according to a McKinsey report. Through incisive in-depth interviews, this book mines the what, how, and why of the practice of data science from the stories, ideas, shop talk, and forecasts of its preeminent practitioners across diverse industries: social network (Yann LeCun, Facebook); professional network (Daniel Tunkelang, LinkedIn); venture capital (Roger Ehrenberg, IA Ventures); enterprise cloud computing and neuroscience (Eric Jonas, formerly Salesforce.com); newspaper and media (Chris Wiggins, The New York Times); streaming television (Caitlin Smallwood, Netflix); music forecast (Victor Hu, Next Big Sound); strategic intelligence (Amy Heineike, Quid); environmental big data (André Karpištšenko, Planet OS); geospatial marketing intelligence (Jonathan Lenaghan, PlaceIQ); advertising (Claudia Perlich, Dstillery); fashion e-commerce (Anna Smith, Rent the Runway); specialty retail (Erin Shellman, Nordstrom); email marketing (John Foreman, MailChimp); predictive sales intelligence (Kira Radinsky, SalesPredict); and humanitarian nonprofit (Jake Porway, DataKind). The book features a stimulating foreword by Google's Director of Research, Peter Norvig. Each of these data scientists shares how he or she tailors the torrent-taming techniques of big data, data visualization, search, and statistics to specific jobs by dint of ingenuity, imagination, patience, and passion. Data Scientists at Work parts the curtain on the interviewees? earliest data projects, how they became data scientists, their discoveries and surprises in working with data, their thoughts on the past, present, and future of the profession, their experiences of team collaboration within their organizations, and the insights they have gained as they get their hands dirty refining mountains of raw data into objects of commercial, scientific, and educational value for their organizations and clients.
Other form:Print version: Gutierrez, Sebastian. Data scientists at work. [Berkeley, CA] : Apress, 2014 9781430265986
Standard no.:10.1007/978-1-4302-6599-3
Review by Choice Review

Data science is one of the most popular career paths available today, and college students are extremely interested in working in this area. Numerous monographs cover the principles and methods of data science, but not many address data scientists' careers and lives. Gutierrez, a data specialist, lecturer, and entrepreneur, interviewed 16 influential data scientists who are working in various fields, ranging from a fashion company to a nonprofit organization. His book will help readers vividly grasp their world. The interviews include many interesting, informative questions related to topics such as career paths, challenging and worthwhile projects, analytical techniques and tools, collaboration with nondata scientists and corporations, advice for new data scientists, opinions on the future of data science, and contributions to their own organizations and society. This book does not focus on an overnight millionaire story in a dot-com business. Instead, it covers data scientists' passions, joys, frustrations, achievements, and pride in their work in the field. It discusses the impact of data science on business solutions as well as the utilization of data science in social and global issues, which will be inspirational to young students who intend to pursue a career in this area. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels of students and general readers. --Seong-Tae Kim, North Carolina A&T State University

Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review