Signals in the Noise
Overview
Section titled “Overview”Most observations are unremarkable. A useful system distinguishes ordinary variation from a pattern that deserves attention.
Figure 1. Synthetic data used to test a prominent visual.
Noise is not the enemy
Section titled “Noise is not the enemy”Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Noise is often evidence of a system behaving normally. Removing all variation can erase the context needed to recognize the exceptional event.
A signal is meaningful because of its context, not merely because it is unusual.
Three views of the same observation
Section titled “Three views of the same observation”Immediate view. What happened now?
Historical view. Is this different from what normally happens?
Relational view. Did something else change at the same time?
From observation to meaning
Section titled “From observation to meaning”| Stage | Question |
|---|---|
| Observe | What happened? |
| Compare | Is it unusual? |
| Correlate | What else changed? |
| Interpret | What might it mean? |
| Act | What should happen next? |
A deliberately sparse section
Section titled “A deliberately sparse section”Sometimes a single sentence deserves space around it.
The absence of an expected signal can itself be a signal.
That changes monitoring from a search for bad events into a search for meaningful changes in behavior.
Closing thought
Section titled “Closing thought”Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. The goal is not perfect visibility. The goal is enough context to make the next decision better than the last one.