Dare I say there’s too much data

I came across a couple great posts on Forbes written by Dan Woods, chief technology officer and editor of Evolved Technologist.

Who Is In Charge Of Your Data?
Why Data Quality Matters

Both talk about the massive amounts of data generated bCy companies today and the fact that much of it is either unused or completely useless.  Some studies estimate that the total cost of poor quality data at $600 Billion and that was in 2002. I wonder what that number is today. Dan writes about the need for large companies to have a CDO (Chief Data Officer). The point person for establishing and defining what data is created, collected, analyzed, etc. across all functions within the organization. Not a bad idea considering today’s push to control out of control data growth with technologies like data de-duplication and thin provisioning.

As a storage guy, I love data growth…what’s better for a hard drive company?  When the argument arises to deploy technologies like the ones above or to create a new czar of data in order to get control, I say bring it on.

The one thing about data is that when used correctly, when it’s harnessed to gain knowledge in order to improve processes, develop new products, market and sell those products, and measure financial success, it just leads to more and more data.  It’s kind of like money. As you earn more and more money, and invest it wisely, (or maybe in these times, save it wisely) it ultimately always leads to more money.  I could go into a whole government spending rant here, but I won’t).

So, dare I say there maybe too much data? No…there’s never too much of the right data.

What say you?

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Image by: http://blogs.census.gov/.a/6a0120a61b56ed970c0120a826053a970b-pi

2010-09-02T10:47:29+00:00

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2 Comments

  1. Mark Wojtasiak September 8, 2010 at 1:59 pm - Reply

    Also, check out a related post by Gardner for more insight on the subject of data warehousing. http://blogs.gartner.com/jack-santos/2010/09/08/are-you-data-warehousing-forget-it/

  2. Mark Wojtasiak September 9, 2010 at 9:19 am - Reply

    Read Write Cloud talks about Big Data and a Critique of Geek Culture…check it out. http://www.readwriteweb.com/cloud/2010/09/hadoop-and-a-critique-on-geek.php

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