It is arguably one of the most bewildering trends of the pandemic: the nerds have become cool. Data scientists were important, but they were fringe figures, labouring over Excel sheets in dark corners. In newspaper offices the “data reporter” was the forgotten cousin of the foreign correspondent or political columnist. These lads — and they do tend to be lads — have become rock stars. What’s more, it turns out that, far from the four-eyed abacus-monkey

Source: The Times December 19, 2021 14:14 UTC