In 2006, the world economic forum created a term “Data is the new oil” just like any other asset. Since then the term data has been superseded by Big Data. The definitions are as numerous as the amount of data. To quote Wikipedia, “In information technology, big data[1][2] is a collection of data sets so large and complex that it becomes difficult to process using on-hand database management tools or traditional data processing applications”. Thus the definition does not include a defined quantity but rather our capability. Thus, the Big Data of a decade ago might be trivial data of today.
However, there are other very interesting definitions of big data too. Rick Smolan, photographer who has created many books, called a “Day in the life” is creating a big book called “The Human face of Big data” has gotten very interested in big data and describes an article in Inc magazine article in which asked Google executive, Marissa Mayer (who just recently has become the CEO of Yahoo)and she described it as “Data that does not fit on the personal computer” or, “Data from two or more sources that you overlap and see some sort of pattern”. However, what convinced Rick was the description of Big Data as “Big Data is like watching the planet develop a nervous system”.