What Does Reality Look Like?

Abstract

Data are collected fervently but not wisely: often, not what is needed but what arises is gathered. Therefore, despite a tsunami of data, painful data gaps still exist.

When data sets do not fit together, the potential within them cannot be exploited. Nevertheless, the information industry has neither a system of order nor any comprehensive standard for data. This deficiency explains why firms launch countless data warehousing, business intelligence (BI) or Big Data projects, and why they appoint multiple chief data officers whose primary task is usually to bring overall order to the companies’ own data.

At the end of the day, the gap will not be closed by the use, however massive, of technology alone. Data analysis on demand on data sets with dozens, or hundreds, of dimensions is not possible without consciousness, intelligence and expertise.