AI report fed by DeepMind, Amazon, Uber urges greater access to public sector data sets

What are tech titans Google, Amazon and Uber agitating for to further the march of machine learning technology and ultimately inject more fuel in the engines of their own dominant platforms? Specifically, they're pushing for free and liberal access to publicly funded data -- urging that this type of data continue to be "open by default," and structured in a way that supports "wider use of research data." After all, why pay to acquire data when there are vast troves of publicly funded information ripe to be squeezed for fresh economic gain? Other items on this machine learning advancement wish-list include new open standards for data (including metadata); research study design that has the "broadest consents that are ethically possible," and a stated desire to rethink the notion of "consent" as a core plank of good data governance -- to grease the pipe in favor of data access and make data holdings "fit for purpose" in the AI age. These suggestions come in a 125-page report published today by the Royal Society, aka the U.K.'s national academy of science, ostensibly aimed at fostering an environment where machine learning technology can flourish in order to unlock mooted productivity gains and economic benefits -- albeit the question of who, ultimately, benefits as more and more data gets squeezed to give up its precious insights is the overarching theme and unanswered question here.