What makes big data different? Most big data proponents talk about the four Vs of big data:
- Volume: The amount of data that we generate and store is growing at an increasing rate, and predictions of the future generally only suggest further increases. Today's multi-gigabyte-sized hard drives will turn into exabyte-sized drives in a few years, and network throughput traffic will be increasing as well. The signal-to-noise ratio can be quite difficult, with important data being lost in the mountain of non-important data.
- Velocity: While related to volume, the velocity of data is increasing too. Modern cars have hundreds of sensors that stream data into their computers, and information from these sensors needs to be analyzed at a sub-second level to operate the car. It isn't just a case of finding answers in the volume of data; those answers often need to come quickly. In some cases, we also simply do not have enough disk space to store data, meaning we also need to make decisions on...