Author and venture capitalist Jim Hornthal believes that the Internet can be far more useful when it comes to big questions. In the new TED Book A Haystack Full of Needles: Cutting Through the Clutter of the Online World to Find a Place, Partner, or President, he flips our current thinking on the noisy datasphere and explores groundbreaking approaches that will help searchers find the useful insights buried deep underneath the drivel. Throughout the book, Hornthal introduces us to innovators who are using data science and data visualization — and looking for patterns — to isolate relevant signals in the noise. Their efforts will have enormous implications for the way we practice medicine and discover new music and movies — even for how we approach meeting a significant other.
A Haystack Full of Needles is available for the Kindle and Nook, as well as through the iBookstore. Or download the TED Books app for your iPad or iPhone.