1.1. Help! I’m drowning!

We’re up to our necks in information, from e-mails, twitter, facebook, websites, reports, financial results and now…big data!
So how do we consider:
What information do we get that we don’t need?
What information don’t we get that we do need?
In other words, just because we are drowning in information, doesn’t mean that it is all useful or sufficient.

1.2. Data and information

One definition of information is

The imparting of knowledge in general. Knowledge communicated concerning some particular fact, subject, or event; that of which one is apprised or told; intelligence, news.
Contrasted with data: that which is obtained by the processing of data.
(Definitions from the Oxford Dictionary of English)
Information can therefore be considered as a collection of data processed in a way so as to communicate knowledge. For example, if you are trying to lose weight, recording your weight every week and plotting the results on a graph will show how successful you have been.
Big Data are large databases of data, for example on customers’ buying habits recorded through the use of loyalty or credit cards. The existence of such large databases makes the managing of information even more important.
Although information can be derived from data, it may also come from other sources. For example, while it may take less time to travel from London to Amsterdam by plane (that’s measurable data), you may prefer to travel by train because it’s easier to work and relax on the train and you don’t like airport queues (that’s not easily measurable). We can’t ignore information because it’s not based on data.

So much information sent to us that may be useful, or may not. We have to choose which is which.
Huge amounts of data available but not being used because we don’t know how to access it productively.

Click here for the solutions