data, the tech is moving on why aren't we?

i have been involved in companies that use large amounts of data to help run their businesses for seven years now. a good time to see how the industry is changing and this is an industry that has had a lot of positive change. what amazes me though is the lack of change at a people level. with database appliances the structure of a data warehouse has fundamentally changed, all that theory on how to optimise your database is being done by hardware. what a bonus!!!! no more debates around normalisation of data, just load the data and get going.

from this you can guess i am a huge fan of database appliances, i used a netezza box for a year and it was fantastic. i have to be honest though, when i was told that it was 100 times faster i felt throwing the sales guy out the door, glad i didn't as he was right. it did raise a bigger issue for me, why are data people so focused on their own technology and defend it to the death? i was one of these.

however i think this defence makes data people make all the wrong decisions. data infrastructure is becoming more and more flexible and the idea that your total structure will stay the same for the next 10 years is for me dead. i think the structure will evolve, especially data that is primarily used for analysis after all it is just a table or as i often tell the it guys "its just a csv file at heart"

the question for me is why are we as data analysts not at all flexible around our data tech yet require infinite flexibility when using the data? surely this has to change, but maybe its just me ;) i do after all only have two readers.

when will twitter become dangerous to business?

today i had my first real experience of how twitter can have very negative affect on a business when a single customer with a following has a bad experience. the question for me is when will this stop businesses from taking risks because if one person has a problem the world hears about it?

how will one persons view point affect a business simply because thousands trust that person and getting your view to your followers is easier that complaining about the problem to the company at fault and lets be honest a whole lot less fun. there has to be great joy from seeing your reader stats and seeing how many people agreed with you.

personally i don't think this is going to be good for society, it is just too spiral out of control.

anyway tell me how you feel about the topic. i now blog from my blackberry....... my tech status just went up a notch