Privacy, a new play written by James Graham, which is currently showing at the Donmar Theatre in London's West End, features two members of Department, Dr Michal Kosinski and Dr David Stillwell. The play puts the digital age under the spotlight and asks whether there is now any such thing as privacy. The parts of Michal and David, who both appear as named characters in Privacy, are played by actors. The play, which is reviewed in the Telegraph, has been a big hit and tickets have sold out.
Michal Kosinski's appearance as a character in a play on the subject of privacy in the digital age should come as no surprise. He has recently been named in the IBM/IQ Big Data 50 as one of the most influential people in data-driven marketing this year, appearing in the category of influencers, strategists and thinkers. Michal is Deputy Director of the Psychometrics Centre and his research focuses on psycho-demographic profiling from online behaviour. To find out more about Michal, see his blog.
David Stillwell is also having a big impact in the sphere of big data research. David has been named this month by Pacific Standard as “one of Social Science's top 30 thinkers under 30” (details will appear in Pacific Standard on Saturday 26th April). David, who is Research Manager at the Psychometrics Centre, is the designer behind the myPersonality Facebook application, which enabled Facebook users to take psychometric tests, and which led to the creation of the myPersonality database, an important research resource used by academics around the globe.
The group pictures displayed above were taken at Michal Kosinski's PhD celebration. The drawings were created by Kalifa Damani.