Mato Ohitika Analytics LLC Releases The Data Sovereignty Initiative

White Paper (June 30, 2019)

Happy summer!

2019 has been a whirlwind of different things for Mato Ohitika Analytics. After over a year of gathering intelligence, I have begun moving towards my strategic plan in machine learning and artificial intelligence. To begin this process, I have been working on the Data Sovereignty Initiative White Paper.

This white paper is basically outlines the key concepts contained in my doctoral dissertation, The Impact of Data Sovereignty on American Indian Self-Determination: A Framework Proof of Concept Using Data Science, to appropriately govern decisions that are made in data analytics, data science, and particularly in the ethical use of machine learning and artificial intelligence.

This effort has been the result of many things I have learned in studying the tech sector and the ongoing issue in privacy and bias in machine learning algorithms. The bulk of my research was to fundamentally design systems that seek to understand the context of culture and how this can be strategically positioned when making scientific inquiries in indigenous communities, and more specifically American Indian tribal communities.

Most people are not aware of the body of Federal Indian Law that governs many decisions American Indian tribal governments can make with respect to their sovereignty and how that relates to their self-determination. These issues are not specific just to American Indian tribes, but the case law is. Any quick search on the internet will reveal the commonality that many indigenous communities face with loss of culture and land base is not an isolated phenomena.

This is why I began designing the data sovereignty framework, a proof of concept to foster a new discussion on ways to promote economic development and nation building using citizen science at its heart.

I wrote in my doctoral work about the citizen science concept:

Citizen Science refers to the general public engagement in scientific research activities when citizens actively contribute to science either with their intellectual effort or surrounding knowledge or with their tools and resources.

The ongoing work in citizen science is another new constantly evolving concept. The European Citizen Science Association (ECSA) is one of the active organizations in developing ethics and principles that guide best practices. The ECSA asserts “Sharing best practices and building capacity” in citizen science is a flexible concept that can be adapted and applied within diverse situations and disciplines.

This concept is similar to our community values and was an easy fit to design the data sovereignty framework in this way to assist community members doing the work by training them in the technical aspects of the applied principles and creating ownership of the work they do everyday. This process is a "living" process and is growing in ways the more I work and gather intelligence from tribal governments, community members and tribal elders.

The Data Sovereignty Initiative White Paper is the process I have been using to custom design SMART solutions for community development.I will touch on three of these concepts I am currently working on and will post updates on these concepts in the future.

The three fundamental topics of interest I am pursuing through the intelligence I have gathered is:

1. Geo Artificial Intelligence, a system used that utilizes deep learning for object classification in mapping infrastructure
2. Designing Indigenous Artificial Intelligence for cultural and language preservation
3. Designing smart Internet of Things (IoT) devices for data collection

The Data Sovereignty Initiative White Paper is the first step in outlining the fundamental structure of these scientific inquiries and I look forward to sharing more about this work in the future.

Here this link to the paper for review: The Data Sovereignty Initiative White Paper (Currently Unavailable)

(Update 7/22/20: Dr. Robertson is working on version 2 of this paper so look forward to that in the future.)

So be well, and let's make america red again!

Mato Ohitika Releases his PhD for Public Dissemination and Study of the Data Sovereignty Initiative: SMART Solutions for Tribal Communities

August 28, 2018

Good day to all!

I have been on a tour of many cities promoting the vision of creating SMART solutions for tribal communities. This doctoral work has been a fundamental shift in talking about data sovereignty not just as a matter of policy. Data science is enveloping every decision we make in our communities from financials to health care and this framework seeks to answer many of these questions.

This manuscript represents a fundamental shift in strategic thinking to begin to address community issues and how data is leveraged for this purpose. This framework has many facets that includes computational statistics, machine learning and the integration of cultural capital metrics to create a strategic act of sovereignty using data science.

Mato Ohitika Analytics open source philosophy means this work can and should be shared with anyone looking to forward the conversation on building ethical data structures to help communities with nation building, rather than building digital infrastructures to divide, i.e. Facebook / Cambridge Analytica.

The past few months has seen this concept beginning to mature and develop into a real force for change. My PhD dissertation: The Impact of Data Sovereignty on American Indian Self-Determination: A Framework Proof of Concept Using Data Science has been released onto my company site for study. As I was finishing this work, I mentioned that I did not design this work sit on a shelf and collect dust, but rather serve as a force for change as the centerpiece of my company mission goals.

I invite you all to read and study the framework I have developed, and as always Let’s Make America Red Again!

How to Design Data Sovereignty for the Community's Benefit

November 19, 2017

Greetings,

I have been hard at work designing a road map for my Data Sovereignty framework, and I have decided to create a blog post to begin explaining the nuances of the vision I have about leveraging data and how community benefit through citizen science.

For those that are not familiar, citizen science is a fairly new concept that allows communities to undertake a complex task under the guidance of a professional scientist or scientific organization. One of my passions is exploring the power of spatial statistics.

Spatial statistics is the theoretical foundation of GIS, or geographic information systems. One of my case studies in my current doctoral dissertations is experimenting with image classifiers to create spatial point patterns of critical infrastructure using drone or satellite imagery.

Why is this important?

First, I find point patterns to be one the most fascinating concepts. Mostly, because we can make such beautiful maps of things. In staying in balance with my Dakota culture; doing things on behalf of my community for their benefit is a governing philosophy lost in translation in this busy world we live in. It is important not to forget where you came from, who guided you, and sacrificed many things for you and me to be here and now.

I won 3rd place in the ESRI 2016 Tribal Story Map Challenge and I realized how powerful telling stories is. Images coupled with advanced statistics, higher education, and nation building is what Mato Ohitika and the Data Sovereignty represent.

I will post more soon, but to conclude, I had an opportunity to present at the ESRI UC in July 2017 of this year and when I heard the plenary, it was like the community was reading my mind. I wanted to share the video of the Oakland County

Michigan and their municipal open sharing portal where the elegantly spoke:

Build it once, Pay for it once, and Everyone Benefits,

View it here: Oakland County Michigan ESRI UC Plenary 2017

I couldn't have said it better myself. Stay tuned we're only getting started. And as always, let's make america red again!

Best,

Joseph
Mato Ohitika Analytics