• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, July 25, 2013

What is algorithm?

Speaking at OMMA RTB, executives on a panel called “Algorithm & Blues: Does Yours Pass Code?” had answers.

Mike Baker, co-founder, president/chief executive officer of DataXu, says: “It’s a business rule. Ask it questions and it returns with a answer. [But] one algorithm doesn’t solve all problems."

Christopher Hansen, president of Netmining says: “It brings disparate data sets and put them together... and does is at scale.” Neal Richter, chief scientist of The Rubicon Project: “It’’s automation. It’s a sequence of steps to solve a problem.

Matt Weight, director of technology for Digitaria, says it represents “doing something useful with the data." Mark Torrance, chief technology officer, of Rocket Fuel says: “It’s a recipe, a set of instructions... [but] you better not write them down with a mistake.”