Data, it’s everywhere, and if we could just organise it a little better it’s possible to make a difference … after all that was the original mission of Google, “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful”.
One engineer at Aussie Broadband seems to think the same way, and has built a system to assist Aussie Broadband to identify customers affected by the bush fires and offer assistance.
By cross-referencing NBN deployment data, geo-coded bushfire location maps and Aussie’s NBN customer locations, Software Development Manager David Barr was able to create a simple way of detecting customers who had lost their NBN connection due to bush fire.
With this data, Aussie Broadband was able to contact those customers and pro-actively offer them credits on their account for services they couldn’t use, and other assistance where applicable.
Yes, it’s easy to look at this and be cynical, or even cry data privacy, but let’s just stop and perhaps acknowledge what’s actually happened here.
A software development geek found a way of using their skills to maybe help people affected by the harsh Australian bush fire season, and try and help in some small way.
I bet you that’s more than most of us will end up doing to help. So well played Mr Barr, well played. That’s using the initiative mate.
