Kevin Slavin: How algorithms shape our world | Video on TED.com
...complex computer programs determine: espionage tactics, stock prices, movie scripts, and architecture. And he warns that we are writing code we can't understand, with implications we can't control
...
black box trading...also sometimes called algo trading, algorithmic trading.
...
(selling or buying large amounts) algorithms to do... break up that big thing into a million little transactions. And the magic and the horror of that is that the same math that you use to break up the big thing into a million little things can be used to find a million little things and sew them back together and figure out what's actually happening in the market.
...
What could go wrong is that a year ago, nine percent of the entire market just disappears in five minutes, and they called it the flash crash of 2:45.
...