EPISODE 102 - What We Learned About What We Learned In 2015

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As everything in the world becomes more interconnected and as the cost of recording and storing data sharply decreases, we've seen a steep rise in the importance of statistics. It seems like there isn't a single facet of human life that isn't quantifiable now that our phones and watches are counting each step and and calorie, while Facebook and Twitter collects each thought.

 

If you don't think data is important, look what happens when we lose it, or realize we didn't even have it at all. In 2015 we had two major hacks in Sony and Ashley Madison, found out Volkswagen's data was a complete lie, and discovered we never were even tracking US police shooting deaths, which is completely *$@#ed.

 

2015 was a huge year for both the data we had and the data we lost. In our final episode of the year, Cracked editor-in-chief Jack O'Brien and Creative Director of Video Dan O'Brien are joined by FiveThirtyEight's Jody Avirgan, host of What's the Point, to recap the year in data.

 

Also, be sure to buy tickets to our next LIVE podcast on Wednesday, January 6th at 7pm at the UCB Sunset theatre in Los Angeles. Jack will be joined by Dan O'Brien, Alex Schmidt and Carmen Angelica to talk about the frustrating intricacies and strange evolution of the English language. Tickets are only $5 and on sale here: http://bit.ly/1OCNQTK