I went on a backpacking trip in California recently. On paper and in photos, it was incredible. But I was not fully present for any of it.

My partner was struggling and needed me. I was split trying to be there for him over phone calls while also showing up for the trip, for the people I was with, and for the experience itself. I wanted to do both. And in trying to do it all, I lost myself completely. I came back exhausted, disconnected, overwhelmed by the feeling of existing in two places at once.

I knew I’d had a good time. But it didn’t feel like mine. I forgot to slow down. I forgot to take care of myself. I forgot to be conscious of my own emotions, my own energy, my own well-being.

I created the name Data Conscious Collective last fall. But it was only after this trip that I had a true reckoning with what consciousness actually means in my life and in the technology I move through every day. I turned inward and started reading about consciousness, the law of attraction, and human design to better understand myself.

I used to love to escape.

For as long as I can remember, I loved to escape. As a child, I’d escape into books, staying up all night reading. In college, my friends literally would call me a runner because I ran away from boys, when I drank, and honestly, throughout the day. I’d move from one activity to the next, never really pausing at any point. I loved the hustle in the escape, the constant adrenaline rush of doing so much in a given amount of time.

But with that comes also constant anxiety, and this need to “turn off my brain.” So instead of being present, I’d doom scroll, send a text, and do anything on my phone or laptop that kept me feeling connected but didn’t feel good. What I realized on that trail is what happens to us every day. We are everywhere except here. We are half-conscious, constantly getting pulled from the now into some other reality with a notification, a ring, a click, a swipe, a constant pull to be somewhere else.

We live in an escapist world fueled by tech.

When I built my vision for Data Conscious Collective, I wanted people to be conscious of their small and large habits around tech and how it affects them, positively or negatively. It is so easy to distract and escape from our lives with technology. Every notification on the phone, every device, social media, and AI are all tools that take us from the present and into some other world - whether it’s someone else’s world, someone else’s technology, someone else’s news. It is so easy for us to be consumed because it’s designed to consume us.

These platforms and devices are designed for convenience and to provide us a frictionless experience. Every swipe is smoother. Every notification is timed. Every interface is built to reduce the moment between impulse and action because that moment of pause is where our conscious decision-making lives.

When I actually pause and think about how a reel on Instagram makes me feel without just scrolling to the next one, it is uncomfortable. Sometimes the reel makes me feel positive, light, and empowered. Most times, it makes me anxious, numb, and disconnected from my body. When I pause and question why a company might need my email address and the annoying result of getting a bazillion unnecessary emails from them in return for a 10% discount, I don’t choose the discount.

That one beat of awareness before the automatic behavior is data consciousness.

It’s about knowing how these systems are working on you, right now, and deciding what actually feels good. Sometimes it is opting in to the tech. Sometimes it’s not. But the choice gets to be your conscious decision, rather than something compulsive, automatic, or required.

I’m not saying this is easy. I still catch myself mid-doomscroll, still feel the pull to hand over my data for the smallest convenience. But it’s a muscle. And the more I practice it, the faster I notice. The faster I can choose differently.

It shifts us from a person sleepwalking through a world built to capture our attention to someone who moves through it with eyes open, making deliberate choices about where your time, your data, your money, and your energy actually go.

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Here are questions I’ve started to ask myself throughout the day to feel more conscious:

1. How is my body feeling at this moment? It is startling how often I find myself disconnected from my body. It can be when I’m looking at my phone, when I’m on my 5th zoom call of the day, or when I’m running on auto-pilot, I realize that I’ve abandoned myself. Asking myself this question forces me to confront my needs.

2. What am I escaping from? I notice how easy it is to reach for my phone or my laptop when I struggle to be in the present moment. I’m escaping procrastination, anxiety, discomfort, distraction and boredom. Sometimes I am even escaping joy, because I’ve built the habit of escape so deeply. But when I do ask myself the question, it brings me back to the present and allows me to live in a way that feels good.

3. What do I need to feel good? More technology is not the answer. Walking, journaling, listening to music and connecting with friends make me feel so much better than any technology distraction. I’ve even been surprised by what has come up; cooking has been a new source of joy that I didn’t realize.

I call my company (and now my Substack) Data Conscious Collective because consciousness is no longer just a spiritual concept; it’s a radical act in a world designed to keep us distracted. What we all crave, probably more than ever, is a feeling of self. A feeling of being good in our own bodies and minds. Technology has gotten so convoluted that it has pulled us out of ourselves and into digital worlds of mind-numbing escape. But our relationship with technology doesn’t have to be this way. Being conscious of our bodies, our needs, our data, and our attention is how we take back agency in this data-driven world and build a life with technology that actually feels like ours.

If any of this resonated with you and you’d like to learn more about how to be data conscious, consider checking out my workshops and services at dataconsciousco.com!Would love to see you at an event soon.

How many times have you heard someone say, “If you don’t understand AI, you’ll be left behind?” It’s usually framed as urgency, designed to intimidate us to adopt faster without looking too deep under the hood.

Data and AI influence our lives long before we consciously opt in.

They shape our work, our health, our children and our work. Yet most of us were never taught how these systems work. We are expected to trust what we do not understand and to participate in infrastructures that were not necessarily built with us in mind.

Critical thinking today means understanding the data and AI systems that influence our lives.

This knowledge is no longer only for the highly technical or technology experts. It is for everyone. It is equivalent to civil literacy. It is equivalent to financial literacy. It is now a form of agency to actively and consciously participate in this data-driven world.

For too long, this knowledge has been gate-kept by being buried in jargon, hype and unnecessary complexity. And the results are predictable: systems that scale bias, products that overlook women, and technologies that extract more from marginalized communities than they give back.

That is why I am launching Data Conscious Collective.

This organization is built on a simple belief: data and AI literacy are no longer optional. They are part of what it means to be an informed, powerful participant in today’s economy. My work focuses on helping people understand where AI meaningfully fits into their businesses and personal lives.

I am not here to teach you technical jargon or the 10 best prompts to use for AI. Instead, I help you think strategically about AI that’s greater than the latest hype cycle. We look at your business and your life holistically to find where AI can act as a strategic values-aligned lever. We will dive into sharper questions: What data are you giving away? Who benefits from this automation? Does this tool actually align with your values? Is this making your business more resilient, or just more reactive?

Through 1:1 personal AI coaching, advisory support for your business or team workshops, I help people move from overwhelmed adoption or resistance to intentional integration.

To mark this launch, I’m hosting my first 90-minute live workshop for women only called Let’s Chat About AI.

We’ll break down what AI actually is, where it’s already influencing your work and life, and how to build a data-conscious mindset so you can use these tools in ways that align with your business and your values.

It’s tomorrow, Tuesday February 24th at 4pm MT/6pm ET.

Register here.

Since my Substack always includes a musing on our data-driven world, here’s what I thought about the most while building my website.

I love the color pink. But being in highly technical spaces, I rarely wear it. The only place I consistently allow it is on my nails. When I started building my brand colors, I kept gravitating toward bright pinks and bold blue-greens. But then I’d talk myself out of them.

If you look at most major tech companies, blue or black dominate.

Facebook, LinkedIn and IBM all use blue to signal trust and neutrality. TikTok, OpenAI, GrokAI all use black to communicate seriousness. They also reflect the homogeneity of the industry: mostly male, mostly uniform, all very boring.

I caught myself wondering if muted tones would make me more credible. If softer colors would attract a broader audience. If I needed to visually signal, “Don’t worry, I’m technical. I belong here.” And then I realized I was subconsciously trying to make my company credible to the existing tech ecosystem instead of building something that felt fully mine.

Pink is feminine. Loud. And it belongs in technology.

I am building a company rooted in the belief that women and marginalized communities deserve to shape the future of AI. Therefore, my brand cannot and will not apologize for being feminine. Pink is my signal that we do not have to mimic the aesthetic of Silicon Valley to be intelligent, strategic, and powerful.

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Data Conscious Collective is intentionally feminine, intentionally bold, and intentionally accessible. It exists to prove that ethics and profitability can co-exist to build a sustainable future alongside technology. It is built on the belief that we can talk about algorithms and be Brown or Black and wear dresses and lipstick, rather than hoodies and jeans. It is a reminder that technology does not belong to one archetype of person.

It belongs to all of us.

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This past weekend, my partner and I went to a crowded bar to watch the NFL Bears Playoff game. Within 20 minutes of entering the bar, I was harassed twice. One, when my bag slightly grazed a 65+ year old man, and he thought the best response to me was, “You can rub that bag anyway you want.” Next, when I asked a group of guys at a table with an empty chair if I could take that chair, one 30+ year-old “man” responded, “You can sit on my lap.”

Moments like this are not isolated. They are the everyday ways men show over and over again that women’s bodies are public, commentable, and available for consumption.

So no, it does not fucking surprise me that GrokAI, a company led by Elon Musk, the most misogynistic (and wealthiest) man in the world, was used by other men to undress women and children.

As a grotesque aside: Elon Musk tweeted to Taylor Swift that he will put a baby in her after she endorsed Kamala Harris in 2024. This is not a joke. This is sexual intimidation with rapist energy. And it tells you exactly who feels entitled to women’s bodies online and offline, and the values he brings into his companies.

This is not new. It is just the latest iteration.

Internet technology has been used by men to harass, exploit, and sexually violate women and children for years. Deepfake pornography did not appear overnight. As early as 2017 and 2018, non-consensual deepfake pornography of celebrities like Maisie Williams, Taylor Swift, Jennifer Lawrence, and Emma Watson was circulating on mainstream platforms such as Pornhub.

“Revenge porn” as a practice predates generative AI entirely, with women overwhelmingly targeted. In the UK, reports to the Revenge Porn Helpline increased by 106% in 2023 alone. OpenAI was released to the public in November 2022.

At the same time, the infrastructure enabling this digital abuse has scaled rapidly and unchecked. Cloud platforms like Dropbox were used for years to store child sexual abuse material before meaningful detection and reporting systems were implemented.

90% of deepfake images and 98% of deepfake videos are non-consensual sexual content of women and underage girls.

So I am not shocked that there is AI-generated abuse openly out there on unregulated internet platforms. It is the inevitable result of technologies and governments built by men, for men, where women’s bodies are treated as objects, and our safety is an afterthought.

There is no protection for any of us.

There is no comprehensive law in the United States that protects a person’s likeness online. When we post photos or videos on Instagram, TikTok, or Facebook, those images can be scraped, reused, and repurposed by individuals, corporations, or AI systems, often without our consent. That is how an AI-generated image of Luigi Mangione’s likeness ended up modeling a Shein shirt.

Only last year did Congress pass the Take It Down Act, making it a federal crime to publish or threaten to publish non-consensual intimate images, including AI-generated ones.

And protections for children effectively end at age 13. The main federal law governing children’s online privacy is the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and was passed in 1998. Think about what the internet looked like then. A proposed bill, the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), would extend protections to teens on social media platforms. It has not been passed.

Each of us chooses whether we enable abuse, through action or silence, or whether we intervene.

The man at the bar chose to harass me.

His friends chose to snicker like they were in middle school.

I chose to tell my partner instead of staying silent.

My partner chose to intervene.

That moment made something painfully clear: men listen to other men.

So men, step up.

The most telling part of that interaction was the harasser’s response when my partner called him out. He said, “I didn’t know it was your girl.” As if harassment is acceptable as long as a woman doesn’t “belong” to another man.

But the best part was my partner’s response: “Like that makes a difference for what you did?”

In that moment, I didn’t matter to the harasser. I was an object to comment on. But my partner’s refusal to excuse him did matter, because it came from another man.

This is the world women live in. And this is why I don’t care how many women you’re friends with, who raised you, or whether you call yourself a feminist. If you cannot stand up to other men when they are racist, sexist, or harassing women, you are not showing up. Silence breeds permission.

Women are tired. We are living under systems run by men who abuse power, while we are erased, exploited, and assaulted. We are tired of having to plead for our humanity.

For my girlies, I hope you find safety and support in whatever advocacy looks like for you. Sometimes that means calling it out directly. Sometimes it means telling a partner, a friend, a bartender, or security. Sometimes it means walking away from the situation. For me, protecting my body means refusing to stay silent, and refusing to stay around men who joke about women, degrade us, or won’t intervene.

We deserve online and offline communities of women and men who know how to step in, speak up, and protect one another. That should be our baseline.

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I turned 30 last month! Entering a new decade has a way of inviting both reflection and intention.

I loved my 20s.

They were adventurous, energetic, and electrically ambitious. I entered the workforce during peak girl boss culture, when hustle was aspirational with admirable women such as Sophia Amoruso, Shonda Rhimes, and Elaine Welteroth. I absorbed the message quickly: if I wanted to grow, I had to move faster, do more, and optimize everything.

My life reflected that mindset. I ran a marathon. I worked full-time while completing a master’s degree. I became a digital nomad, hopping between Airbnbs every few weeks. I tracked everything online: my runs, my sleep, my habits, my productivity. My world was mediated through apps. Want to see my friends? There’s an app. Want a date? There’s an app. Looking for the cheapest flight? There’s an app.

Technology structured my life and I loved it.

But when I think about the moments that brought me the most fulfillment over the last decade, they weren’t digital milestones or optimized streaks. They didn’t come from dashboards, posts or metrics.

Joy happened offline.

I felt deeply connected to my body lying on the grass by the Charles River in Boston after I ran 16 miles for the first time. I felt incredible peace the first time I camped alone in the Umpqua National Forest in Oregon, zipped into a tent under some of the tallest trees I’ve ever seen. I felt joy watching my puppy chase snowballs as they rolled down a mountain trail, fully absorbed in the moment.

Those moments didn’t ask me to be better. They just asked me to be there.

So as I step into my 30s, I’m choosing something different. Less optimization. More presence. Less future-proofing. More joy, right now.

My 20s taught me how to endure discomfort for long-term gain. My 30s will teach me that joy doesn’t need to be postponed, optimized, or captured to be legitimate. It doesn’t need to feed an algorithm or justify itself through productivity. Joy can live in small, physical moments that resist quantification: a really good cup of coffee, mountain air filling my lungs on a hike, cuddling my partner and my dog while watching Seinfeld.

This shift has made me look more closely at my relationship with technology, data, and AI, not from a place of rejection, but from one of discernment. These are the habits I’m grounding myself in to build a healthier relationship with technology.

1. I will interrupt the autopilot.
I’ve started paying attention to how reflexive my tech habits are. I open Google Maps even when I know exactly where I’m going. I don’t even look at it; it just runs in the background. I pick up my phone, unlock it, scroll through my apps for some reason, then put it back down without knowing why. There’s a subconscious pressure to check, respond, and consume. Less of that in my 30s. I use technology with intention and purpose.

2. I am connected to my body.
Technology has a way of pulling me out of my body and into a half-conscious state. I open my phone and an hour goes by doomscrolling. I look at my Garmin watch to validate how I sleep, rather than listening to my body. From now on, I want to pay attention to my signals first, rather than blindly following the tech.

3. I am data conscious.
As more of my life becomes digitized, I pay closer attention to what data I give away and what data I consume. From loyalty programs to location tracking to personalized pricing, participation is often framed as convenience, but it comes with tradeoffs. Moving forward, I want to be more intentional about when I opt in, who benefits from my data, and how it’s being used. Not everything needs access to me.

I want this next decade to be defined by grounded presence in my physical life. Technology may assist, but it will no longer lead. I will.

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I have two identities that tug at me. I am Indian, so I was raised in a home rooted in eastern ideals of collective good, family, and tradition. I am also American, so I am shaped by western ideals of individuality, ambition, and productivity. I live in two worlds constantly, and I feel the friction between the two cultures’ values.

If I can feel tension between two cultures, what happens when AI, that’s built from one cultural worldview, is deployed in other parts of the world?

AI especially holds values because, unlike earlier technologies, large language models don’t just store or retrieve information, they model the world. They rank, filter, and generate meaning autonomously, making judgments about relevance, importance, and truth. They operationalize historical patterns, cultural norms, and societal hierarchies reinforcing the creators’ perspective about what matters and what doesn’t. And right now, it embodies the values of a very small slice of creators.

Out of the Forbes 2025 Top 50 AI companies, 49 are from Western countries. Forty-one from the U.S. alone. One company, Sakana AI, is from Japan. The AI industry is U.S.-led, male-led, value-led by Silicon Valley logic. Therefore AI’s default values are not global values.

AI practices currently embody three Western techno-values: Efficiency over care, Universality over context and Impartiality over positionality. These values are not inherently bad, but they aren’t universal. Yet, they’re shaping how all of us are seen, governed, and treated.

AI values efficiency over care.

You probably have heard the term, the AI race. In a race, speed is a virtue and care is an inconvenience. And this is what the AI industry is structured around: build fast, release early, dominate the market. Harm is considered an acceptable byproduct. And we’re already seeing the consequences in the US and globally. In the US, a teenager died after ChatGPT encouraged suicidal ideation. This is what happens when being “first to market” is more important than slowing down to understand the nuances of billions of people of all ages and demographics using the products. Globally, the consequences are even more stark. Tech companies extract data from Global South populations precisely because it is cheap, abundant, and unregulated. They can access massive datasets quickly and easily, harvesting the data through welfare programs, mobile apps, biometric systems, and “smart” public services. Entire societies are being restructured around models optimized for Western values and goals.

AI values universality over context.

AI loves generalizing. It wants one model for everyone because that’s easy to optimize and get right. But humans are contextual, cultural, and specific. And our data has historical and cultural context. Even in cases where AI companies try to mitigate bias, there is still harm because universality is still at the forefront. Last year Google Gemini generated images of Black and Brown people as Nazi soldiers while “trying” to be inclusive. This is because the model applied universal fairness rules without applying historical or cultural context. And this isn’t limited to outputs; researchers and data scientists often replicate the same universalizing impulse in their own methods. In Bangladesh, Western researchers built a dataset on faith-based communal violence with almost no input from the people who actually face that violence. Local annotators, hired to label the data, were forced to categorize slurs targeting their own communities, and their emotional pain was dismissed as “bias” rather than recognized as essential context. And because the researchers didn’t understand the political history of the region, they mislabeled entire categories of violence, baking those misunderstandings into future AI systems.

AI cannot be universal because human experience is not universal. Applying U.S.-centric logic to India, Kenya, or Brazil is not innovation, it’s arrogance.

AI values impartiality over positionality.

The tech world’s biggest lie they tell themselves (and us) is that they are impartial companies, building impartial products to be deployed to billions of people. In the US, there are tons of examples of AI not actually being impartial even though they claim to be. From resume scanners that downgrade women’s applications to predictive policing that reinforces decades of racialized surveillance. And the most recent example is women on LinkedIn are literally getting more engagement when they change their gender to “male.” Globally, these biases only intensify. Through public–private partnerships across the Global South, Western companies end up defining what “development” even means. They choose which data matters, which problems are worth solving, and which communities count, shifting power away from local governments, cultures, and histories, and toward corporations operating from a Western value system.

If AI is built on Silicon Valley values, then at some point we have to decide: are these the values we want raising our kids, shaping our cultures, and quietly governing our day-to-day lives? Because AI doesn’t have to be built this way.

1. Community values can shape AI.

I believe neighborhoods, schools, cities, and cultural groups can decide the values they want AI to reflect. Across Ghana, Mali, and Malaysia, community-led tech projects are building tools rooted in local needs, cultural realities, and collective wellbeing. These initiatives treat communities as co-designers, not data points to extract from. We don’t need to stay with the AI value system we’ve been given. We can build tech from a different set of principles that are relational, rooted, contextual and culturally grounded.

2. There are other ways to build AI.

How are AI products that harm children, ruin the environment, displace populations at alarming rates and can’t even say “I don’t know” when it doesn’t know the answer, the best products in the world?! Really the best? We don’t have to accept this. AI can be built on feminist principles, transparency principles, Afrocentric principles, Eastern principles, Indigenous principles. It can actually reflect the diversity of the world it claims to serve. Imagine models designed to optimize care instead of engagement. Imagine systems that know when to stop and pull a human in. Imagine tools built for specific needs rather than one mega-model trying to do everything. We deserve better. And we can build better.

3. Being Data-Conscious Means Using Tech in a Way That Honors Your Values

Look, I get that we can’t boycott all technology and live in the mountains. But data-consciousness isn’t about abstaining. It’s about using tech and data in a way that aligns with your values.

If you value joy, don’t engage with rage-bait content trying to manufacture your outrage. If you value rest, close TikTok when doom scrolling feels inevitable and put your phone across the room. If you value community, choose platforms, creators, or tools that uplift rather than erode connection.

AI is shaping the future. But the values shaping AI are still up for negotiation. And the most powerful thing any of us can do right now is refuse the idea that the world must adopt Silicon Valley’s values by default.

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I love training plans. I enjoy building elaborate spreadsheets filled with pace goals, progress charts, and color-coded milestones. I don’t just have goals. I track them, measure them, and quantify the hell out of them.

This summer, I am summiting Mount Whitney, the tallest peak in the continental U.S., clocking in at 14,505 feet. Let the training plan fun begin.

But as much as I love structure, I’ve learned that data can be a double-edged sword. I wear a Garmin, and while it’s great for tracking progress, it also has a way of feeding my anxiety, turning helpful metrics into obsessive check-ins and spirals of self-doubt.

I wake up with data.

I check my Garmin sleep score before I even get out of bed. I started doing this last year to optimize my sleep routine. I experimented with different bedtimes, adjusted my alarm, and figured out when I genuinely feel most rested. But now that I have a rhythm, do I need a score to tell me how I slept? Probably not. Yet, I still check it every single day.

That’s the slippery slope: data can be helpful, until it becomes compulsive. Until it stops feeling like guidance and starts feeling like judgment.

The Metrics That Mess with Me

Let’s break down the numbers I obsess over:

• Training Status: Garmin has four levels of training state: “Recovery,” “Maintaining,” “Productive,” or “Overreaching.” If I’m not in “Productive” mode, I panic. Even though I know it doesn’t accurately track all of my training days. It doesn’t account for yoga, fitness classes, or strength training, so it misses key data points about my exercise routine. Yet, when that training status is not in “Productive,” I feel like I’m behind. I feel so guilty.

• VO2 Max: This one estimates my cardiovascular fitness and updates only with outdoor activities, such as running, walking, hiking, and biking. Therefore, I pressure myself to get outside, even when I need rest or the weather sucks. I use it as a performance barometer when it is a stressor.

• Fitness Age: This is the strangest number that I obsess over. I’m not even sure how scientifically backed it is. Even on the Garmin page, the description behind this data point is vague. For example, I’m 29. Garmin says my “fitness age” is 28, but suggests I aim for 25.5. Why? Who knows. Apparently, I need to lose weight, increase my workout frequency, and push harder to regain my 25-year-old self. However, I’m not 25 anymore. My body knows it. My schedule knows it. Yet, this number makes me feel like I’m aging wrong. It begs the question: Is this data point even necessary?

• Resting Heart Rate: I’ve been trying to get mine below 60, not because a doctor told me to, but because I read somewhere years ago that it’s a sign of peak health. My resting heart rate is perfectly healthy now, but the inner athlete in me still chases this arbitrary number. I track it weekly like a stock ticker, even though that competitive, performance-at-all-costs mindset doesn’t serve me anymore.

• Altitude Acclimation: This one’s helpful. I often hike above 10,000 feet, which gives me insight into how well I’m adapting; a rare win.

• The Scale: Recently, I started weighing myself again. I hate it. I’ve become fixated on it, not for its looks, but because I’ll be carrying a 30-pound pack up Mount Whitney, and I want to “lighten the load.” I know strength is more important than weight. My fitness goals are not about reaching a specific weight, but rather how well I can complete a 14er or a 6-mile run. But when that number doesn’t go down, I spiral.

Health tech is a blessing and a curse.

Wearables like Garmin, Apple Watch, Oura, and Whoop promise to make us healthier, stronger, and more in control. They give us access to a universe of data, and we consume it because it feels empowering. It feels like progress, tracked in real-time and revealed through fun charts. It gives us a sense of control over our health, right on our wrists, whether it’s truly accurate or not.

However, without context or metrics that are blatantly arbitrary, these numbers are deeply demotivating. They do not always accurately reflect our reality, goals, or bodies. Even when the data feels personal, it often isn’t. And it’s essential to remember that wearables aren’t just about improving your health. They’re part of a $84+ billion industry built on your pursuit of “better.

1. Wearables don’t account for our changing needs and fitness goals.

   Training for a 14er is not the same as prepping for a half marathon. Nor is it the same as merely trying to stretch our legs and breathe during a stressful week. But wearables don’t know the difference. They measure our effort against a fixed definition of progress and reward constant intensity, not sustainability.

   These devices aren’t designed for balance, rest, or joy. They are modeled after the needs of elite athletes whose full-time job is to perform at the highest level. So when our watch tells us we’re not “productive” or stuck in “recovery,” it can feel like failure. But really, it’s a mismatch between how we live and how the system was built.

2. The data isn’t as personalized as it claims to be.

   Most wearables rely on generalized algorithms built on data from people like us (e.g., our height, weight, and estimated activity levels), rather than the actual complexities of individuals. Wearable companies are now trying to access more of your data to create a more comprehensive health profile of you. Apple can collect your menstrual cycle. Whoops, monitors your stress, glucose, mood, and more.

   However, this raises a larger question: should tech companies, whose primary goal is engagement and optimization, really be the ones holding your most intimate health information?

3. We don’t need more data. We need better guidance.
   I don’t need a watch to tell me I slept poorly; I can feel it. Most of these platforms don’t offer real insights. They dump numbers on us and expect us to figure out what to do. Most of the time, we’re left guessing and feeling bad that the numbers are what they are. What would be more helpful is technology that can provide us with context on our data and help us achieve our own personalized goals.

So, is this tech really helping us thrive, or just making us feel like we’re never enough?

Now, when I catch myself spiraling, I pause and ask:

1. How does this data point actually serve my fitness or health goals?

2. Am I using this information to grow or just to punish myself?

3. Do I have actionable steps I can take, or am I just drowning in numbers I don’t know what to do with?

We deserve tools that support how we actually live, not metrics that shame us into achieving a certain level of performance. We deserve health data that helps us navigate the world with greater confidence. The goal isn’t to become perfectly optimized machines. It’s to live well in bodies that can carry us through mountains, messy lives, and moments of joy.

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I was always called an angry girl growing up. I got mad at the small injustices I faced. My family would lecture me about how I shouldn’t be so angry for a 10-, 13-, 15-year-old girl. The girl part always infuriated me, as if girls can’t be angry.

Boys can throw temper tantrums well into their 70s (see Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and even some men around you). Yet, a 15-year-old girl who subconsciously understood the subtle xenophobia, racism, and misogyny that she faced wasn’t allowed to be mad.

I live in a paradox, just like every other woman.

I’m supposed to be grateful. I immigrated to what used to be one of the freest nations in the world. I have an incredible education, a great job, and a supportive family. I am freer than the women who came before me. I live a very good life.

Yet, I am bombarded by misogyny every single day.

From personal experiences of assault, harassment, catcalling, casual sexism at work, among friends, family, and strangers, to watching my rights being debated and stripped away as if my life is an object to be managed. A uterus to be controlled.

This paradox also exists in how women’s data is collected and leveraged.

Women’s experiences are often overlooked in datasets. There’s a well-documented gender data gap in every industry. We’re missing from healthcare, public transportation, city design, childcare (!!), economics, sports—everything that makes up a functioning society.

Even when women’s experiences are studied and represented, when the data is loud, glaring, and undeniable, change is slow, non-existent, or regressive.

We KNOW that 1 in 6 women are assaulted in the United States in their lifetime. Yet, the US has elected a rapist as president.

We know that companies with more women in leadership are 25% more likely to outperform financially. Yet, DEI programs are getting slashed.

The U.S. has the highest maternal mortality rate of any high-income country: 22 deaths per 100,000 births. 80% of those deaths are preventable. Other countries? Less than 5 per 100,000. Yet, reproductive rights are under attack.

I live with two opposing truths that define womanhood:

Truth #1: My experiences are denied because they're not in the data.

I worry for my safety walking or Ubering home alone at night, because there is little research on women’s safety.

I’m told to “be grateful” at work, expected to do the grunt work to “prove myself”, while the men at my level don’t have to, because there’s little research on the gendered and racial biases of male leadership.

I’m told my race no longer matters for opportunities, since I’m South Asian. As if I don’t still get asked, “Where are you really from?” As if people don’t still comment on my skin tone, assume I’ll be forced into an arranged marriage, or act surprised that I speak English “so well.” All while data on women like me is still scarce in the U.S.

Truth #2: Even when there is data to back up my experiences, I am gaslit.

A few weeks ago, my friends and I presented at a startup pitch about a women’s travel safety app idea. The panel consisted of four men and one woman. Great odds for us.

Even though we started with clear data, 80% of women fear for their safety while traveling, and walked through market research and survey insights, one male judge had the audacity to give us the feedback:

“Summary of the survey info would have helped - personal experience not sufficient to define a market.”

This is just a sliver of the daily gaslighting women face.

If this mental, emotional, and physical exhaustion of living in this paradox isn’t enough, we’re still expected to be grateful for the scraps of freedom we’ve been given. Because women aren’t treated as full humans, any ounce of freedom is dangled like a gift, constantly under threat of being taken away the moment we stop saying thank you.

So to my women who are exhausted by the paradox:

1. Trust your experiences. They matter.

When something feels wrong, it probably is. We carry generations of intuition, resistance, and survival in our bones. You deserve better than the car dealer charging you more because you’re a woman. You deserve better than walking home at night with poorly lit streets and a lack of safety. You deserve better than being gaslit out of promotions, out of wanting kids, out of not wanting kids, out of everything.

You are not the problem. The world is.

2. Build your community and lean into it.

My community of women is the reason I am confident, ambitious, and compassionate. I was the girl who was constantly told she was “too much”. Too angry, too loud, too bossy. I was the girl that people tried to beat into the small, shy, obedient box. My community of female friends, coworkers, and mentors remind me that these traits make me incredible.

3. Do what you want.

Seriously, if there’s anything I’d love for a woman to take away, it’s this:

No version of womanhood will appease the world as it exists now.

There is no data discovery that will be the silver bullet to gaining equality. There is not enough smiling or being nice to get people to listen to us. Whiteness will not save women. Nothing will shield us from the harm of systems that weren’t built for us. So why try to fit into them?

I’ll end with my favorite quote from Nikki Kendall:

“Women do not have to be respectable to be valuable.”

There are women, especially the 51% of White women who voted for Donald Trump, who uphold the belief that some women are less valuable. That if women are not white, cis, straight, or aligned with their politics and religion, their worth is negotiable. That respectability is the price of their humanity.

With that belief, we are burying Palestinian women, Jewish women, Black women, Indigenous women, Transwomen, poor women and countless more. We are burying women who are seen as disposable because they don’t fit into the patriarchal, racist, misogynistic mold of what is “acceptable.”

Women do not have to be respectable to be valuable.

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Last month, while I was waiting at the Mumbai airport lounge, mindlessly scrolling on my phone, I noticed a blue oval around the time, indicating my location was being actively used. I thought that was odd since I had not used Google Maps recently, so I closed my other apps in case some other app was tracking me in the background. When I closed my Priority Pass app, the blue oval went away. Priority Pass was tracking my location just because it was open in the background.

I found it weird that Priority Pass tracked my location even when I wasn’t actively using the app. I am lousy at fully closing out apps. (Yes, I am also THAT person who has over one thousand unopened emails.) But the fact that it showed up so blatantly on my phone made me consider whether I wanted Priority Pass to track my location at all.

For one app, this might seem trivial. But what about all the apps on my phone?

I had 134 apps on my phone, so over 100 companies have access to my data, whether it be my location, photos, or contacts. After a quick mental anguish over this, I deleted 50 apps—yes, 50! That left me with 84 apps. Curious about their access, I went through each app’s settings.

It turns out, many apps were collecting more data than I expected.

Almost half of my apps had access to my geolocation data. I understand why, it makes recommendations convenient. For example, when I open Priority Pass, it uses my location to show the airport I am at.

Yet, is the trade-off of the 10 seconds I save from not typing in the airport worth them tracking my location? I decided it wasn’t and turned their location access off.

All of my banking apps, except Citibank, can access my location. Banks use geolocation to determine the distance and time between transactions and identify unusual transaction patterns. Since this benefits me greatly, I kept the location features on all my credit card banking apps.

Google Maps had access to my contacts, so I could type in a name and instantly get directions if their address was saved. I’ve never used this feature and likely never will. While I get the convenience, handing Google full access to my contacts wasn’t worth the trade-off, so I turned it off. Lyft also had access to my contacts for easier ride-sharing and fare-splitting options. I do not use these options either so I also turned their contacts’ access off.

Both LinkedIn and Shazam had “Live Activities” turned on. According to Apple’s Developer site, “A Live Activity displays up-to-date information from your app, allowing people to view the progress of an activity, event, or task at a glance.” I found no official explanation on how LinkedIn uses this, just ChatGPT’s best guesses. This seemed suss, so I turned it off. Shazam uses Live Activities to find music while the app is in the background. I do not want Shazam listening in the background so I also turned that functionality off.

Lastly, some apps, such as Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and even AllTrails, have full access to all of my photos. Full access means they have access to not only the photos I post but every image in my photo library, even the ones I never share. They can also access the photo’s metadata, such as the date and time of the photo, its location, and its camera details.

In our new world of generative AI, deepfakes, and facial recognition software, I have been wary of how my image data could be used to train models without my conscious consent. Therefore, I revoked access to AllTrails and LinkedIn since I don’t post pictures there anyway. For Instagram and Facebook, I switched to 'Limited Access,' meaning I now have to manually select photos each time I post. It adds two extra clicks, but that’s a small price to pay to keep Meta from having access to thousands of my images.

As I reviewed my settings, one question kept coming to mind:

Is the trade-off for the convenience worth the data I am providing?

My image and location data are among the most valuable pieces of information about me. They capture my face, body type, and skin color while also tracking every place I go, essentially mapping my life both physically and over time.

For some apps, like banking and Google Maps, the benefits outweigh the risks. But for others, like Priority Pass or AllTrails, giving up my location data isn’t worth the minor convenience of quicker recommendations.

My image data is especially sensitive; it’s my likeness. And without full transparency on how companies are using this data, I can’t justify giving them unrestricted access. So I choose privacy over convenience.

This is a choice we must make individually. I welcome you to ask yourself the next time you’re on your phone, in your car, or connecting to free Wi-Fi at a coffee shop:

1. What data am I providing to these companies?

2. What benefits do I receive from that giving up that data?

3. Is the trade-off worth it?

We must start considering the trade-offs of our data, not only for our privacy and safety but also for the world around us. As more companies become 'data-driven' and AI reliance grows, the demand for data centers is skyrocketing, straining already scarce water resources. A mid-sized data center consumes about 300,000 gallons of water per day, the same as 100,000 homes. Is the convenience of a personalized recommendation worth someone losing access to clean water? Which trade-offs are justifiable, and which aren’t? These are the questions we must ask as a society navigating an increasingly data-driven world.

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Last year, I became acutely aware of how much of an energy-suck social media is. I felt like I was always on a platform - Instagram, TikTok, or Snapchat - sometimes for a second, sometimes for an hour. I felt out of control. Do you ever close Instagram and then subconsciously open it a minute later? That was me constantly.

When I was on these platforms, I felt anxious. When I wasn’t sharing or commenting, I felt guilty. It was an endless cycle of frustration and fatigue. I didn’t feel connected to my friends or the world; I was mindlessly trapped in whatever content the feed highlighted that day.

A couple of weeks ago, Mark Zuckerberg announced changes to Meta’s social media platforms - Facebook, Instagram, and Threads- that impact fact-checking, hate speech, and political content. Yet, there was no mention of changing their skewed algorithms, which currently fail to deliver more well-rounded content to users.

Last week, TikTok faced its drama in the U.S. with a brief but chaotic ban-or-not-ban debacle.

It’s absurd that global platforms, used by over half the world’s population, are managed so haphazardly.

These platforms operate on recommendation algorithms that are designed to keep you on the app as long as possible without any regard for the range of content or truthfulness. By removing any guardrails on fact-checking or harmful content, Zuckerberg is saying, “We’ll feed you content that we think you’ll click on, without any concern for its accuracy, its harm, or the broader consequences.”

The TikTok controversy and Meta’s rollback of policies highlight a deeper issue: neither the CEOs nor governments seem equipped—or willing—to manage these platforms ethically for the benefit of all.

The burden of trust now falls onto us.

Imagine going to a doctor who recommends treatments without verifying if they’re effective, safe, or even real. They just hand you a list and say, “You figure out what’s best for you!” You’d never trust them.

So why should we trust these platforms under these conditions?

Algorithms that recommend harmful or false information are not neutral tools, they are broken systems. If TikTok and Meta do not want the responsibility of fact-checking or monitoring content, their algorithms shouldn’t be recommendation algorithms. Instead, they can be a chronological, popularity-driven, or search-based algorithm, giving users control over the content they see, rather than passively consuming harmful suggestions.

We need a different relationship with social media.

If we are truly burdened with figuring out how to trust these apps, let’s reconsider how much of that burden we want to carry. Is being on these apps for “free” really worth the time spent deciphering truth from lies, feeling anxious, doom scrolling, and witnessing hate?

1. What is your relationship with social media going to be?

   I want social media to be a space I visit briefly to relax and connect with the world. It’s not my one-stop shop for connection, community, or knowledge. I want to watch a few stand-up bits, share some memes with my friends, and get a glimpse of what’s happening in the world. I’d like a healthy relationship with social media, one where I control my time and know when to log off.

2. What are your boundaries with social media?

   Since social media fuels my anxiety, I’ve set clear limits. I deleted all social media apps except Facebook and Instagram. I kept Facebook solely for Facebook Marketplace, while Instagram remains my only true social app. I’ve also placed an hour-long time limit on both apps using my phone’s settings, which locks me out once I’ve reached the limit.

   I’m also paying attention to my emotions while I’m on these platforms. If I come across posts that trigger anxiety, anger, or mind-numbing exhaustion, I close the app and do something soothing - like play with my dog, text a friend, or do a chore. This practice has shown me how emotionally volatile the algorithmic feed is. One second I’m laughing at a reel; the next, I’m pissed at a post. It’s emotional whiplash! We don’t experience that kind of volatility in real life; if we did, we’d worry something was wrong. So why are we allowing a couple of companies to have that kind of power over us?

3. How are you going to behave on the apps?

   I used to reshare a lot on Instagram. I shared anything I had a strong reaction to, which meant I shared posts that would make me angry and I thought others needed to feel angry about too. However, as I’ve been rethinking my relationship with social media and the amount of emotional volatility it begets, I want to behave kinder on the apps. There’s enough distress in the world and I do not need to add to it. Now, I focus on sharing knowledge, kindness, and joy with the world; these are my metrics to share, post, and comment on social media.

4. What do you enjoy or get from social media that you can get elsewhere?

   I genuinely enjoy the community, connection, and knowledge I get from social media. Through Instagram, I found an OutdoorAsian group in my state, connected with diverse Indian-American diaspora accounts, and learned about trans rights from advocates that I probably wouldn’t have encountered otherwise. These are all beautiful benefits from a global platform that connects diverse experiences. But they no longer outweigh the emotional toll of their algorithmic feeds. That’s why I’m finding ways to cultivate these experiences outside social media—building offline communities, calling friends, and using news sources or podcasts to learn. This shift helps me feel less dependent on social media and more grounded in meaningful, nuanced connections.

Social Media is a tool that we get to leverage however we see fit. There are influencers out there making bank on social media and that is incredible that they figured out how to use the tool for their best life. But that’s not my path, and that’s okay. I want social media to be a place where I can connect with the world briefly, not for it to be my primary source of truth and connection. You get to decide how to make social media work for you.

How will you use it?

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I love the start of a new year. It’s a time of reflection and reimagining of self and possibilities. I’m also a planner at heart, so January is a beautiful time to imagine and plan the ideal yet practical world I could build for myself. I methodically plan the year with goals, actions, habits and mindset to drive joy and success.

This is where I enjoy using AI as a tool that can support me. I treat ChatGPT as my goal-setting partner, helping me discover the skills and habits I may need to achieve the goals for the year.

I fed my 3 goals into ChatGPT and used it to help me drive methods, mindsets and habits towards them. It helped me outline actionable steps toward my goals, created a tailored morning routine that fit my schedule, and even suggested daily time-blocks to balance rigor, rest, and fun.

Here are my favorite responses to some of the prompts I asked to set my 2025 for success:

Prompt: What are the skills and experiences I need to make these goals successful?

My inputs: I provided the skills and experiences I already have to achieve these goals and asked it to define additional skills and experiences needed. I kept my skills and experiences broad, intentionally avoiding details like specific job roles, companies, or certifications. Rather I used statements such as “Experience and knowledge in data + consulting” or “Experience in having a consistent exercise routine, while training for a marathon” to emphasize my current experiences.

ChatGPT’s response: For each goal, it provided 3-4 skills and experiences I need and under each skill and experience it provided an action, resource, and a next step! The resource was the most interesting, since that wasn’t even something I thought of in the prompt, yet a great addition to consider.

I have a habit of being overambitious and overcommitting to actions before they even occur and ChatGPT can exacerbate that with its information. Therefore I prioritized only the actions and resources I found most interesting or manageable, which were about 10 actions/resources out of the 36 it provided.

Prompt: Based on my goals and the below notes on my schedule constraints and ideal habits, develop my ideal weekly schedule.

My inputs: I provided notes on my current work, class and life schedule constraints, ideal habits and ideal wakeup and sleep times. I did not provide exact schedules of my day, rather gave it general frameworks such as “I have class in the morning and evening” or “I want to hike on weekends.”

ChatGPT’s response: ChatGPT gave me a weekday and weekend morning routine as well as a daily schedule, all with time blocks! It was also grounding because it provided time blocks for errands and life things which I usually forget when I time block myself.

It even offered tips on maintaining consistency with my new schedule. I didn’t find them very helpful but interesting nonetheless since it provided insights beyond my initial prompt. ChatGPT then asked if I’d like it to create a digital calendar template for Notion or Google Calendar which I said yes to. That didn’t work as I’d expected it to. It built a CSV file of what it spit out, but in that CSV only the morning routine was dated and timed, not the rest of the weekly schedule. It’s important to remember that although it may sound like it knows what it’s doing, ChatGPT is still a large language model with limitations!

Below are why each goal is important to me as well as the mindset I'd like to have around each. Help me create 3 lofty questions I can take 10 mins journaling about to start my day in the best mindset.

My inputs: I gave a paragraph around why each goal is important to me and some mindsets I’d like to have such as “I am deserving of wealth and success,” “I am strong, healthy and powerful”, and “I deserve love and everlasting happiness.”

ChatGPT’s response: It gave me a lofty question for each goal that I will enjoy answering before I start each day! It even suggested that I spend 10 mins on one question each day versus answering all 3 each day. Along with the lofty question, it provided a consolidated mindset “tagline” and a short sentence on “why this works.” It even provided a “Final Tip: At the end of your journaling session, write one action step for the day that aligns with your reflections.” Again an added-value that was not included in my prompt!

Using ChatGPT as a way to elevate my 2025 planning is a great example on how AI can be used to support us in a way that benefits us. It is important to note that we have to be careful how we provide our data so that we aren’t giving it too much information or sensitive information that can target us.

Here’s a quick reminder of personal information people often share on ChatGPT, but isn’t necessary to achieve useful results:

• Full names

• Locations

• Financial status and aspirations

• Company names or Job titles

• An exact daily schedule

• Mental health vulnerabilities or intimate details about a person

Throughout my goal-setting process, I kept my inputs intentionally vague. I avoided sharing personal details like names, locations, or intimate mental health information. I still got useful results which I leveraged as a framework to build on to for the exact habits and schedule that works for me in 2025. Using AI tools with intention shows how technology, when thoughtfully applied, can be a reliable ally in achieving our goals.

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As a survivor, I think a lot about consent. My first day at college orientation, we learned the definition of consent. Consent is knowing, voluntary, and clear permission by words or actions to engage in sexual activity. Two weeks later, my ability to consent was taken away from me, resulting in my assault. 

When I look back on that experience, what strikes me most is how my ability to consent was taken from me. I was put in a compromising position where I could not knowingly and voluntarily give my consent, and so it was assumed without my choice. 

Data collection practices compromise people’s ability to knowingly and voluntarily consent on their data. 

Let’s broaden consent outside of sexual activities. What are activities you knowingly and voluntarily consent to? What are activities you may not knowingly and voluntarily consent to? I live most of my life actively consenting; I consent to participate at work; I consent to having a relationship with my partner; I consent to getting hugs from my friends and my family members. 

But I honestly never know to the extent of which I am consenting to giving up my data in ways that harm me.  When I click the “Agree” button on the terms and conditions of an app, I have no clue what I am agreeing to. The terms and conditions are long and arduous that make eyes glaze over while I quickly scroll to get onto the device or app. 

How much of my data are they collecting? What are they doing with it? Who are they selling it to? How long are they going to store it? How is it going to benefit me?

The answers to these questions should be easy and transparent to the users, yet we barely know anything about how our most sacred information is being used. 

Imagine agreeing to go on a date, only to find out that your date expected sex because of an unspoken agreement. It’s absurd!

Yes, I voluntarily click the “agree” button, but I do not know the full extent to what that means. Both must be there to be considered consent by the above definition. 

Big tech coerces us to give up our data.

Recently I wanted to try out a new task management app. As soon as I got onto the first screen, it asked for my name and my email. I am increasingly reluctant to give up those pieces of information because I recognize it’s another piece of data that is being used to build a detailed picture of my online and offline life to potentially exploit me. However, there was no alternative in the app besides giving up that data to access it. I did not want to consent to releasing my name and email to the app; yet I was met with no choice but to exit. I couldn’t test it out and then give up my data later.

If we go back to a dating analogy, that’s like your date saying “if you want to go out on a date with me, then you have to have sex with me.” Why is my desire to try out a tool automatically lead to data collection?

Now there are many task management apps out there and so I can choose another app that may more align with my values around data collection, but that’s not the case with every tool we’d like to use. 

Meta and Google are the worst culprits. Meta owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp and has over 3 billion daily users on their platforms, almost half of the global population. Google processes almost 8 billion searches a day. It’s almost impossible to escape from these companies' clutches. The alternatives to Meta’s platforms are TikTok and X, with equally questionable privacy policies. There are privacy-forward alternatives to Google such as  DuckDuckGo, StartPage and Brave that block trackers; the former two note that they do not collect or store data. Moreover, a lot of our physical life has also become digital or “smart”, from the software on our cars, to our “smart” thermometers - all tools designed to collect data about our lives.

Coercion in the context of sexual violence is the application of unreasonable pressure for sexual access. Similarly, big tech companies leverage their enormous power to pressure users into participating in their platforms without appropriate alternatives. This concentration of power forces us to surrender our personal data, making it difficult, if not impossible, to fully understand or genuinely consent to how that data is used.

We must know how our data is collected to give proper consent.

The main way that our data is being collected without our knowing and voluntary consent is through Trackers. Trackers are tools and code that are embedded into websites to basically follow you around while you’re online, collecting pieces of information about your personal information, behaviors, IP addresses, location etc. The data collected is then used to create a detailed profile of you, allowing companies to target you and influence your preferences, behaviors, and purchasing choices. The most common trackers are cookies, small text files stored on your device to remember details like login information, browsing preferences, or shopping cart items. Other types of trackers include pixel tags, device fingerprinting, and URL tracking. We are literally being tracked all the time. 

There are policies to mitigate tracking and give us some form of control, typically involving opt-in or opt-out systems. Opt-in mechanisms require you to actively choose to share your data; if you don’t click ‘agree’ or ‘yes,’ then your data remains protected. It’s an active and resounding consent, in line with the definition of consent. In contrast, opt-out mechanisms assume consent by default, collecting your data unless you specifically choose to reject it. This is like being expected to give sex, unless you actively say no. GDPR, the European Union regulation around data collection and privacy, mainly operates as an opt-in policy. The United States does not have a federal law that requires companies to provide opt-in. Certain states have laws to varying degrees around data collection, mainly through opt-out policies. No state has a law for an opt-in policy. 

Consent is our greatest power.

Data collection methods rely on our complacency and mindless clicking. The best way to take back our consent is to be conscious about our clicks and actively choose where we provide our data.

1. Pause and reflect. Before signing up for that rewards program for a retailer you’ll only use once, or quickly clicking “allow all” in the cookies preferences, pause and think about whether you really have to give up that data. Consider questions like: Why is the company asking for that data? What do you receive in return and is that trade worth it?

2. Learn about our data rights. The United States does not have any meaningful data transparency and regulation laws at the federal level. But states are doing incredible things around data rights and privacy. For example, Colorado has the Colorado Privacy Act that requires opt-out options for marketing trackers and opt-in consent for sensitive data collection, such as race and health data. Pay attention to who’s speaking about data rights at all levels of government. After all, data rights are human rights. 

3. Imagine a data-driven world that is driven by consent rather than our silence. Imagine a consent-based data collection system that truly serves you: where you decide how your data is used to benefit you, and where you control what information is collected and what remains private, known only to you. I love a good recommendation for movies or songs, so I enjoy a Netflix recommendation or a Spotify recommendation. I do not like gendered-recommendations such as clothing, laser removal ads or botox on my feed so I don’t want my gender or race to be collected and used to exploit me. I also don’t want my health data to be collected to train algorithms to make health predictions or diagnosis, knowing that algorithmic biases negatively impact Black and Brown people’s lives. 

Without our data, these companies would be nothing. Apple’s privacy settings on the iPhone, which allowed users to opt out of app tracking, caused Facebook to lose almost $10 billion in revenue. That’s how much our data is worth to these companies. If our data is the reason these companies are so damn successful, shouldn’t we have a say in how our data is used?

I recently watched a podcast clip on Instagram between two Gen Z-ers, one advocating for Donald Trump and the other for Kamala Harris. The 1-minute, 28-second clip was pretty enraging—hence why it went viral. The argument was tense, and although in concept I sided with the one advocating for Harris, the exaggerated and performative nature of it was off-putting. For the next hour, I was annoyed. A 1-minute video caused over 60 minutes of turmoil. I replayed the debate in my head, thinking about how frustrating the conversation I witnessed was, since it represented such extremes. After the turmoil came exhaustion. I was sad I had “wasted” an hour of my life over a video that taught me nothing new or interesting about either campaign or the issues at hand. It was an echo pretending to have substance, but it was really empty—another useless, out-of-touch conversation on a screen. Here were people my age, with similar educational backgrounds, living in similar cities, and yet I could not feel more disconnected from them.

Despite what's on the screens, we have more in common than what divides us.

I often solo road-trip across the US with my dog, and I love visiting rural areas with people whose background couldn’t be more different than mine. These places remind me that despite the extremes fed to us on social media, in the news, or through ads, the reality is we are all much more reasonable and grounded, with far more in common than what divides us. In northern Michigan, I met a White male veteran who was disgruntled by the state of the country. Our life experiences could not be more different, and yet we found common ground, from agreeing that 'billionaires shouldn't exist' to recognizing that the quality of life has significantly declined and no longer serves most people. We may vote for different candidates and are on different sides of the current political spectrum, but at the end of the day, a White male veteran from rural Michigan and an Indian immigrant from Connecticut found shared understanding in wanting a safe, sustainable life for ourselves and those around us.

The algorithms are inhuman.

Eighty percent of Americans get their news from social media. Yet, social media algorithms are not designed to show us facts and nuance; they’re not designed to spark healthy conversations or debates; they’re not designed to connect us (no matter what Mark Zuckerberg says). They’re designed to take humanity out of context, to place our characteristics, behaviors, and values in neat numbers that can be manipulated to capture our attention, our data, and our money. Complexity goes against algorithmic design—if it can’t put our belief systems in a box, it can’t sell to us. But we are complex. There is nuance in my experiences and therefore nuance in my ideologies that don’t fit into the rhetoric that is shown on social media and in the new. Our democratic institutions are complex and they should be to represent the nuance and diversity of its people. A 2023 USC study shows that frequent users of social media platforms share roughly the same amount of fake news as they do real news, even sharing fake news that goes against their political beliefs. We are literally sharing against our own beliefs for more likes, views, and the addictive high that the false idea of “likeability” gives us.

We are human.

Today is election day. We will see the extremes amplified across every screen today and probably for the next couple of months. Divisiveness and conflict will reign on the Internet and on our TVs, because that captures our attention, our data, and our money. But I invite you to ask a simple question: Where is the humanity?

We live in an online world filled with fakeness, and it is only going to be filled with more fake content as generative AI becomes more prominent. But our neighbor isn’t fake. Our friend isn’t fake. The stranger we pass by isn’t fake. We can ground ourselves in our humanity.

Every time an audio-based AI says my name, it is a reminder that AI is not designed for me. I have heard some outrageous pronunciations of my name, Sanjana (pronounced Sun-juh-na), throughout the years from Sayn-jay-na to straight up Sanjaya. The iterations of AI tend to butcher my name more than any human does.

AI is not designed for me. 

This thought comes up time and time again as my life increasingly depends on data and technology. Whether it's gendered ads that prey on my insecurities or concerns about crude messages and unwanted images on dating apps without any safeguards, I am reminded that AI is not built for me. it’s not built for women. 

I think about the countless stories that come out about the bias and harm that AI models have on women’s daily lives, from period tracking products being biased to revenge porn based on AI-created images that endangers women’s lives. 

AI is not designed for women. 

It’s not surprising though. If I think about who’s building these models, it’s mostly white, mostly men dictating the AI algorithms. Women still only make up 22% of AI professionals globally and 18% of all AI researchers are women. Of course it’s not designed for us; we’re barely in the room to influence! 

More broadly, a pervasive gender data gap exists across industries. Women's data is consistently underrepresented in research, medicine, and countless other areas. Yet, data is at the core of everything we use—it’s embedded in our daily lives, influencing decisions from the partners we meet to the healthcare we receive. These technologies that are meant to serve everyone barely include our data!

It’s imperative, especially with the rise of Generative AI, for women not to be left behind. Women and girls are 25% less likely than men to know how to leverage digital technology for basic purposes. This is not okay. We need to understand these tools, recognize their limitations, and demand better technologies, research, and policies around AI that benefit and protect women. 

Calling all the girlies. 

I encourage you to question the technologies in your life and if it’s serving your needs. Let’s talk about the ways AI works for us and the ways that they could be so much better for us. On a more specific note, learn about deep fakes and AI-curated images. I'm wary of the generative AI image-altering capabilities being rolled out to the public through Apple's Intelligence on iPhones and Google Pixel's Gemini, and how these technologies could disproportionately harm women.

Let’s reimagine AI in a way that protects and empowers us. AI is so powerful, why shouldn’t it be designed for women?

I always thought that data literacy was reserved for the most technical people. The AI researchers and computer engineers who were making these incredible machine learning models. I believed in this so much that, in my pursuit of data literacy, I joined a Masters in Data Science, so I too can get this elite knowledge. 

For my first final in an intro Data Science course, we were asked to build a simple social media algorithm. And as I was coding this model, feeling like a brown woman Mark Zuckerberg in his early days, it dawned on me that Facebook and Instagram are simple pattern recognition models. Generative AI are complex language pattern models that find patterns among gigantic datasets.

We live in a data-driven world.

Almost every choice we make is now guided by data - from the clothes we buy to who we date to the jobs we apply for are all influenced by algorithms. Algorithms that are recommending our life choices. And yet only 30% of Americans can recognize all forms of algorithms. And just 21 percent of the global workforce are fully confident in their data literacy skills. If data and AI are influencing every aspect of our lives, then data literacy can no longer only be reserved for computer scientists or AI researchers; every person must have a foundation of data literacy to navigate today’s world. So let’s begin today. 

What are Algorithms?

Algorithms are a set of rules that computers follow to solve problems. Typically, our data is turned into a format that these algorithms can process to uncover patterns or make predictions.

For example, recommendation algorithms use data like your likes, dislikes, and how long you engage with certain content to predict and suggest what you might enjoy next.

What is Machine Learning?

Machine learning uses data and algorithms to uncover patterns or predict outcomes. Machine learning is unique because these models “learn” from the data. It improves itself over time without needing to specifically be reprogrammed for new scenarios. These models take current and past datasets to analyze patterns and learn how the world might work. 

For example, think about dating apps. The app “learns” from your profile, who you’ve liked/disliked, who you’ve messaged or ignored, and other actions you take on the app. It then uses that information to “predict” your preferences and make match recommendations. Companies use these learnings to decide which matches to show you for free vs. which ones to gate keep so that you pay for their subscriptions.

What is AI?

AI stands for Artificial Intelligence and refers to computer systems doing “human-like tasks” - think writing, reading, recommending, even recognizing faces and voices.  Today, AI is machine learning, a data science method that allows computer systems to identify patterns in data and make decisions.  It’s very important to note that although AI may seem like they have human-like intelligence, they don’t. AI are advanced pattern matching tools, and the patterns they’re recognizing are human language and actions. 

For example, think about the English language; it follows a specific pattern, “subject-verb-object.” For instance, “I hike a mountain”. When we use Generative AI, like ChatGPT, the models base its response on this pattern. It doesn’t know or understand the MEANING behind the words, but it has “learned” the patterns of the English structure by analyzing large amounts of text data over the years.

We have our foundation. Now what?

Data literacy is critical thinking in our data-driven world.

So, just like critical thinking, it’s about noticing where data shows up in your life and making sense of it.

Here are three ways to easily exercise your data literacy muscles:

1. Get curious. Notice the places in which you’re interacting with data or your data is being collected. I invite you to spend one day and note down every interaction you have with data (either you’re using it, or your data is being collected). Where do you notice data influencing your actions or decisions? Comment or DM your list in this Substack! I’ll share mine as well. :) 

2. Play with AI tools. This is a great way to get a sense of the patterns and algorithms behind these technologies. I enjoy asking the same question in different models (like Gemini and ChatGPT) to get a better feel for how each one works.

3. Be imaginative. These tools and algorithms are supposed to be designed FOR US. Imagine what would make your life easier, better and more fulfilled, with and without all this data and technology. I believe this will allow us to be intentional with the technologies we use in a way that makes our life better. 

Not everyone needs to feel like a brown woman Mark Zuckerberg to learn data literacy. That’s gatekeeping the most valuable and crucial skill in today’s world. We all deserve, and in my belief should have the right, to understand the most influential technologies in our lifetime. So let’s get data literate y’all.

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What I’m reading/listening/exploring: Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture

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I think about data all the time. No seriously all the time. 

I have a Garmin watch that tracks my sleep cycles. Every morning, I look at my sleep score and see how well I slept that night. I literally start my day looking at data. Is that a little crazy? Maybe. 

I think about the ways in which my data is used - my name, my address, my location, my likes/dislikes, what I eat, what I wear, my face - to either benefit me or exploit me. 

I think about the ways in which we have power over OUR data and the many ways we do not. I love technology. I’m a futurist. But I’m also hyper-aware that our data is not our own and that I, 99% of the time, do not have a choice in how my data is used. 

I believe with the rise of Generative AI, everyone needs to start thinking about data just a little bit more. The world is changing rapidly. And companies and governments are using our data to do that.

This forum is my observations on living life in a data-driven world.

My goal is simple: let’s all think a little more about our data so we can be more active participants with it. Let’s engage and get curious on ways data is impacting our lives - the good, the bad, the weird, the ugly.

Ask questions on data, share stories in the comments and reach out to me if you’d like to chat more about all things data. I’m not kidding when I say this is what consumes my brain ALL THE TIME.

Catch you in the algorithms.

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