One of the most discussed concerns surrounding big data today is privacy. While many powerful analytics are possible with the detailed data that is now collected on each of us, the sensitive nature of much of that data requires rethinking data practices and applications.
It is challenging to make big data simple to access and easy to analyze. While there are many reasons for this, the one I want to focus on here is that handling big data, given how big data projects are usually implemented today, requires users to learn new tools and technologies. This makes adoption a difficult and lengthy journey.
There are many challenges to incorporating big data into analytic processes – technical, skill set, and cultural challenges for example. But you must also consider the challenge of thinking differently about the analytics you need to do and how you will go about doing them.
In the past few months, in addition to my usual travel around the United States, I have had the pleasure of visiting both Europe and Asia to meet with customers and discuss analytics and big data. It was very interesting to me how similar the conversations were regardless of where I was in the world.
One of the best ways to improve the power of your analytics is to include some totally new information. The use of new information can enable huge leaps in the effectiveness, predictive power, and accuracy of your analytics.
I am going to go out on a limb, put a prediction in writing, and hope that I’m not eating serious humble pie in 12 months! I predict that in 2013, the big data bubble will begin to spring some serious leaks.
One thing that has struck me recently is that most of the focus when discussing big data is upon the technologies involved. The consensus seems to be that the biggest challenge with big data is a technological one, yet I don’t believe this to be the case.
At first glance, the idea of starting small with big data sounds like an oxymoron. It just doesn’t sound right, does it? I believe that if you take the time to think about it, you’ll realize that not only is it the way to go, but it is simply an extension of a method that has been successful in working with new data sources for many years.
It is good to remember in today’s hype-filled big data world that there is no “easy” button for big data. In fact, in many ways, big data is quite difficult to deal with.
Companies are scrambling today to understand what big data is and what they should do with it. However, there is one major mistake that I am seeing a number of organizations make.
