There has been lots of talk lately about big data and how we will handle it, as though it was a new problem. Given, data is being produced faster than ever before in history. However, in the retail world, transaction analysis and POS data are not new. The word we are looking for is diverse. It isn’t just numeric data anymore; it is text based and image based.

This interesting information was found on IT-Director.com in their article, “SAS and social media analysis.” Analyzing data takes up space and when that data is made up of numbers, it is a cleaner process, i.e., requires less storage. Analyzing word data with no agreed-upon context and numerous definitions makes analysis disruptive, i.e., requires much more space. Enter social media into the picture and it gets much messier.

Melody K. Smith

Sponsored by Access Innovations, the world leader in taxonomies, metadata, and semantic enrichment to make your content findable.