2021 MIT IDE Annual Report

EVENTS
High Impact,
High Visibility
Events continue to be our primary means
for spreading our research insights far
and wide.
CONFERENCE ON DIGITAL
EXPERIMENTATION (CoDE)
The ever-growing attendance at MIT CoDE
reflects the tremendous interest among data
professionals and academics in online testing
methods. This year’s two-day event was the
largest in its 14-year history, a testament to the
rise in these online testing methods.
500
REGISTERED
ATTENDEES
8
PLENARY
SPEAKERS
100
PARALLEL
SESSIONS
CoDE convenes leading researchers conducting and analyzing large-scale randomized experiments in digitally mediated
social and economic environments, in various scientific disciplines including economics and computer science.
VIEW SELECT SESSIONS
THE MIT IDE SOCIAL MEDIA SUMMIT
(SMS @ MIT)
SMS@MIT brought together social technology luminaries
to examine one of the most critical and compelling
issues of our time —the impact of social media on our
democracies, our economies, and our public health. The
ambitious vision of this first event was not just to identify
problems but to craft meaningful solutions to the social
media crisis that promote the promise of social media
and avoid its perils. The free event drew an impressive
20,000 attendees, the largest event ever hosted at MIT.
The SMS@MIT is now an annual IDE flagship.
Read:
Social Media at a Crossroads, 25 Solutions from
the Social Media Summit
IDE ANNUAL CONFERENCE
It’s one thing to read new research
reports and analysis; quite another
to hear and see the author explain
their work first-hand, even if it’s
virtual. The goal of our annual
conference is to connect the dots
between scholarly data and the
IDE members and sponsors who
need actionable insights from our
research every day. Attendees had
the opportunity to interact with
researchers, discuss studies, and
determine how their organization—
or society as a whole—can benefit
from this cutting-edge work.
The day offered a fast-paced, winwin
interchange where members
gained access to IDE experts and
the IDE team learned lessons from
practitioners in the field.
MIT ANALYTICS LAB (A-LAB)
The MIT Analytics Lab offers an
opportunity for IDE stakeholders
to submit projects and data to MIT
graduate student teams that will
use analytics, machine learning,
and other methods of analysis to
develop results that will diagnose,
enable, or uncover solutions to real
business issues and opportunities.
The 2021 Pitch Day was
held on September 18. The
2021 Final Presentations
were held on December
DIGITAL MEDIA & PRINCIPLED
ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN
GROWTH MARKETS
Maria Ressa, the Philippines’ first
Nobel Prize Laureate, joined the IDE
for a special, live event.
Ressa, who is the founder of
Rappler and IDE digital fellow,
spoke with Sinan Aral about the
impetus of founding Rappler and
how she and the company have
used principled entrepreneurship
to leverage their platform for
social change. She also shared her
successes and lessons learned as a
leader and public figure.
The November 17 event was
produced in conjunction with The
Legatum Center for Development
and Entrepreneurship at MIT.
PLATFORM STRATEGY SUMMIT
The IDE hosted the internationally
recognized Platform Strategy
Summit for the ninth year running.
An impressive lineup of engaging
leaders and researchers examined
how platform ecosystems attract
new business partners, streamline
operations, and optimize digital
technologies. Songtradr, the
world’s largest music licensing
marketplace, selected artists David
Davis and Alice Pisano to perform
live for our audience.
08