Big Data ROI: A Big Pet Peeve

Apr 25, 2013 by Phil Simon

I have a love-hate relationship with Twitter. I love the spontaneity of it all and the ability to connect with new folks. On the other hand, though, it’s exceedingly difficult to summarize a cogent argument in only 140 characters.

Big Data and My Simple View of the World

Feb 28, 2013 by Phil Simon

For a while now, I’ve had this working theory of the business world. In short, there are three types of people: 1) those who get it; 2) those that don’t get it but want to get it; and 3) those that don’t get it and don’t want to get it.

Defining Big Data: Is it a Big Deal?

Feb 21, 2013 by Phil Simon

Two words. Seven letters. Three syllables.

How hard could it be to define a term that seems so, well, simple. I found out the hard way that defining Big Data is anything but easy. In fact, in my forthcoming book, I devote nearly 20 pages to describing that which we now call Big Data. Call it a big list of characteristics.

Exploring Hadoop for the Enterprise

Jan 14, 2013 by Joyce Norris-Montanari

I was looking at the number of employment opportunities that had the word HADOOP in them. I found it fascinating that a new technology could be adopted by the industry so quickly, and show up on the employment websites. But why would Hadoop be considered by every enterprise? I don’t think it should be. Here’s why:

What Does the Future of Big Data Have in Store?

Dec 20, 2012 by Phil Simon

Where do we store all of this data?

It’s a question that many CIOs are asking themselves these days. Relational databases just aren’t built to store petabytes of unstructured data. Today, the usual suspects include Hadoop and columnar, NoSQL and NewSQL databases. Yes, data storage costs have plummeted over the last fifteen years, but do we really need to store historical information?

2013 Will be a Big Year

Dec 06, 2012 by Phil Simon

Every December, tech pundits like me speculate about what’s next. We look into our crystal balls and make predictions about the next big thing. According to this Slashdot article, that thing may be Big Data. From the piece:

Hadoop and the Great Sears’ Big Data Experiment

Nov 22, 2012 by Phil Simon

Fifty years ago, Sears Roebuck was the Amazon of today. For a wide variety of reasons, though, it has lost considerable ground to big-box retailers like Target and Wal-Mart, not to mention online behemoths. Now owned by Kmart, Sears is struggling to survive. In this post, I ask the question: Is Big Data the answer to Sears’ problems?

5 Things I Know About Big Data

Nov 15, 2012 by Phil Simon

I’ve written before on my own site about the difficulty in defining Big Data. Long story short, precisely defining the term isn’t terribly easy to do. Over the past few months, I have been extensively researching Big Data. It’s been a fun ride and I have discovered that it’s much easier to list the characteristics of Big Data rather than try to settle on a “perfect” definition.

So, in this post, I’ll discuss a few of my findings and observations. Ironically, I have no data on the first two assertions. Call them hunches.

Content and Context

Aug 14, 2012 by David Loshin

Big data seems to be all the rage this year, and a lot of the focus is the use of big data analytics platforms (such as hardware appliances, software appliances, as well as open source tools such as Hadoop) to collect, consolidate, and analyze massive amounts of data absorbed or streamed from a wide variety of sources. Much of the frenzy centers on text streamed via social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook, although there are many other forums that both mirror topics and cross-post among themselves.