Communicating the Value of Big Data
September 28, 2012
The IT world has successfully communicated the message that Big Data is valuable. It has been less successful in explaining how, exactly. Following its recent BI & Analytics Perspectives Conference, Computerworld realizes that “Finding the Business Value in Big Data is a Big Problem.” The IT pros gathered at the conference seem to agree that the current problem with the data analytics phenomenon is figuring out just what to do with all that information. The article explains:
“Technology vendors and industry analysts tout the enormous business benefits that enterprises can gain from mashing up traditional structured data with unstructured data from the cloud, mobile devices, social media channels and other sources. But business executives have little idea of how to take advantage of Big Data or how to articulate their requirements to IT, according to several executives at the show.
“Business leaders often ‘don’t know what they don’t know,’ said one frustrated IT manager, and therefore they are incapable of explaining to IT shops what to do with all this data that’s being accumulated.”
A similar problem crops up with most new technologies. People have to break out of decades-old thought patterns to even see the possibilities—an overwhelming task for most humans. Some companies are creating “innovation labs” with the sole purpose of getting the best ROI from their Big Data investments.
That’s probably a good thing, but I think vendors must take responsibility for explaining the value in their products. Collecting and peering at data is only valuable as a means to some profitable end. Those who supply Big Data solutions must find ways to illustrate the worth of their products with clear examples, suggestions, and starting points for potential clients. If they cannot, their businesses may not outlast what could become known as the Big Data Fad of the early 21st Century.
Cynthia Murrell, September 28, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Data Analytics in Genetic Research
September 28, 2012
We’re pleased to see this excellent example of the use of analytics. ScienceDaily reveals, “Information Theory Helps Unravel DNA’s Genetic Code.” Specifically, scientists at the Indian Institute of Technology in Delhi were working on one of today’s biggest biology challenges—predicting the distribution of coding and noncoding regions (exons and introns, respectively) in a previously unannotated genome. The researchers were able to speed the process using information theory techniques. The brief write up explains:
“The researchers were able to achieve this breakthrough in speed by looking at how electrical charges are distributed in the DNA nucleotide bases. This distribution, known as the dipole moment, affects the stability, solubility, melting point, and other physio-chemical properties of DNA that have been used in the past to distinguish exons and introns.
“The research team computed the ‘superinformation,’ or a measure of the randomness of the randomness, for the angles of the dipole moments in a sequence of nucleotides. For both double- and single-strand forms of DNA, the superinformation of the introns was significantly higher than for the exons.”
Studying DNA regions helps scientists better understand diseases and develop more effective treatments. Just one of the many ways data analytics can be used for something other than boosting a corporations’ bottom line.
Cynthia Murrell, September 28, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
LucidWorks Growth Focuses on the User Experience and Search Features
September 27, 2012
We recently commented on the Forbes’ article titled, “LucidWorks: Bringing Search to Big Data” and the rising usage of Lucene/Solr technology across dominating companies such as Netflix, AT&T, and Twitter. The same article also brings to light the fact that the world of data is shifting from mainly numbers to one that is essentially text-based, thanks to outlets such as social networking.
This is where LucidWorks enters. The company is aware that the Web search box is the key to helping any and all users find the information they are looking for, even if they are inept at programming language. This transition will be bringing Big Data to a larger audience with easy-to-use search features. LucidWorks knows search technology is where Big Data needs to focus and the company plans on becoming the leader for this enterprise. Strides in this direction were made in May with the launch of a big data beta project, LucidWorks Big Data, which certifies and integrates Apache open source components to develop and manage big data applications.
We learn about the company’s plan and focus on user-experience in the article:
“‘Users are missing from the big data conversation,’ argues [Grant Ingersoll, Chief Scientist for LucidWorks.] Paying attention to what users are doing helps improve the real-time, ad-hoc access to the data by improving relevance and search results. The analysis of users’ interaction with the system could also provide, as an interesting by-product, new insights about the business. In other words, what your employees do with your data may tell you a whole lot about how your business is functioning and even where it’s heading.’”
Created in 2008 as Lucid Imagination, the team is adept at managing and developing in the ever-shifting enterprise search marketplace. Changing the company’s business model to become innovators in the open source technology realm and now tackling the global emphasis on Big Data, the developers are aware of what needs to be done to fully contribute and make an impact in the expanding market. With a commitment to innovation and user-experience, we agree with Forbes about the future of LucidWorks:
“LucidWorks may represent a new wave of change, using search—the first ‘killer app’ of the Web—to unlock the value of enterprises’ much expanded big data stores and overflowing organizational memories.”
We are anxious to watch the company continue to grow and become leaders in search, content processing, and Big Data analytics.
Andrea Hayden, September 27, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext.
What Is the Most Deployed Search System in the World?
September 26, 2012
I just had a brief chat with LucidWorks. In that call, I learned about a surprising fact presented in the Forbes’ article “LucidWorks: Bringing Search to Big Data.” Here’s the point I noted:
Lucene/Solr is the most deployed search technology in the world, used by companies such as Netflix, AT&T, Sears, Ford, and Verizon. According to Ingersoll, Twitter search is powered by Lucene, handling more than a billion queries a day, with close to four hundred million tweets indexed and available within 50 milliseconds of being posted (see here for a 2010 post about Lucene by the Twitter engineering team).
There may be many search options. Some are free and spin outs of university or personal research projects (Elasticsearch, SearchBox). Others are well backed start ups (Palantir, Centrifuge Systems). Some are hybrids (Basho and Datastax).
If Forbes is correct, there is one vendor poised to disrupt search, analytics, and content processing—LucidWorks. More about this Forbes article in a day or two.
Don C Anderson, September 26, 2012
Sponsored by Augmentext
Upcoming Discussion on Big Data and HealthCare
September 26, 2012
GigaOM recently reported on an upcoming round table discussion between several experts in the field of big data analytics in the article, “Using Big Data to Reinvent Health Care.”
According to the article, the panel of experts GigaOM Analyst Jody Ranck and LexisNexis HPCC Systems Data Scientist Joe Prichard will use real world examples to address how big data services are being used in early detection of diseases as well as how to detect fraud through big data software.
When providing some background on the topic, the article states:
“Today’s health care system is challenged in managing data and costs. From the rise of an aging population to the increase of fraud, waste and abuse, health care organizations are challenged to efficiently maximize their resources for legitimate patients who need care. New health care legislation brings challenges and opportunities for health care organizations and their patients. With health care costs projected to spiral into the trillions of dollars in the next few years, many organizations are applying the advances in IT, mobile and other forms of technology to the problem of containing costs and finding new and innovative ways to care for patients.”
Big data reinventing health care is a remarkable claim. This should be an interesting discussion to keep tabs on.
Jasmine Ashton, September 26, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Small Businesses Falling Short in Monitoring Online Conversations
September 25, 2012
The multitude of data needing to be analyzed by marketing professionals on a daily basis is currently coming from an overwhelming number of different channels. This makes it very difficult for marketing professionals to manually track all the disparate data coming in. Therefore, no one should be surprised that a recent survey conducted by PR Newswire found that “Only 37% of Small Business Communicators Monitor Conversations on a Daily Basis.”
According to the article, the majority of marketing and communications professionals agree that in order to maintain an online following and relevant online conversations, it is important to listen to a variety of relevant social media channels.
However, the survey found:
“Fewer than 40% of small business communicators monitor conversations daily, despite the speed with which conversations and rumors can take hold online. The good news is that only 3% of communicators reported that they don’t do any monitoring. Another 18% indicated they monitor conversations weekly.
One reason why the majority of communicators aren’t listening on a daily basis likely stems from the simple fact that many people find themselves relying upon multiple channels in order to keep tabs of key social networks and online groups.”
As big data analytics technology becomes more readily available and affordable, small businesses are going to have to invest in these products in order to stay abreast of the needs of their clients and constituencies.
Jasmine Ashton, September 25, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Centrifuge Releases Latest Version of Visual Networks Analytics Platform
September 24, 2012
Centrifuge recently published “Centrifuge Delivers Scalable Big Data Analytics With Visual Networks Analytics Version 2.7” which discusses a new solution that minimizes the need for data scientists while accelerating discovery across disparate data points. Sounds pretty cool…and complicated.
According to the news release, Centrifuge, a provider of Big Data analytics and visualization solutions for fraud, security and risk, announced the availability of the latest version of its Visual Networks Analytics platform. It addresses the need to derive context intelligence and pattern discovery in big data by delivering powerful technology that addresses the growing need to quickly filter, sift and understand large amounts of data.
Renee Lorton, Centrifuge CEO, explains:
“Corporate Information security is a big data analytics challenge that cannot be addressed with traditional data mining, BI, or legacy analytics approaches. The sheer volume and complexity requires a powerful investigative discovery approach that is easy enough for a non-data scientist to use. Machine data, for example, is one of the fastest growing segments of big data, generated by websites, applications, servers, networks, mobile devices and other sources. Now, discovering patterns in Big Data is both easy and cost effective with Centrifuge’s powerful interactive data visualization.”
With an increasing number of organizations being hacked, information security is becoming a higher priority. A variety of industries would benefit from this technology.
Jasmine Ashton, September 24, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
IntelTrax Top Stories: September 14 to September 20
September 24, 2012
This week the IntelTrax advanced intelligence systems blog delivered some interesting stories that are especially pertinent to those looking to solve the big data problem with analytics solutions.
One field that could see a great deal of benefits from data analytics is education. “The Future of Education Lies with Data Analytics” foresees an education system that is taught through computerized software programs that collect data on the length of time it takes students to master material. Unlike teachers who have limited time and availability, this software would provide instant feedback and compare students to classmates as well as other students across the country.
When discussing the value of this new system, the article states:
“In comparing these two learning environments, it is apparent that current school evaluations suffer from several limitations. Many of the typical pedagogies provide little immediate feedback to students, require teachers to spend hours grading routine assignments, aren’t very proactive about showing students how to improve comprehension, and fail to take advantage of digital resources that can improve the learning process. This is unfortunate because data-driven approaches make it possible to study learning in real-time and offer systematic feedback to students and teachers.”
In the field of data analytics, new and innovative partnerships are always coming about. “Tivo and Scripps Sign Deal to Improve Audience Analytics” announces a deal made between Tivo Research and Analytics and Scripps Networks Interactive, allowing Scripps to access TRA’s audience insights and analytics.
Here’s how it works:
“Media TRAnalytics® TV Auto Ratings launched in January 2012 and enables networks and advertisers to identify the right TV programming based on the make and model of automobile purchases by households watching specific networks and programs. By matching households of television tuning and automotive registration data from Experian Automotive’s North American Vehicle Database (NVDB), TRA provides advertisers, advertising agencies and television networks the industry’s largest household-level single-source solution to plan, buy, sell and evaluate the automotive industry’s current investment in television advertising.”
Big data analytics tools allow for companies to be able to gain valuable insights from your credit card statements, web searches, and social media activity. “Social Media Allows for Personal Analytics as Marketing Tools” explains how businesses can harness the data being put out of social media platforms like Facebook in order to gain insights in order to predict buying behavior.
When explaining the service, the article states:
“It also provides an interesting insight into the kind of machinations that Facebook itself could easily be doing with the data in house. Line this up with the output of Facebook’s own data export tool and you get a good picture for the truth of how much data is being collated. Consider combining patterns across tens or hundreds of millions of profiles with this level of detail and you start to get a picture of the power of the platform.”
Being able to uncover marketing trends and insights about customer behavior is becoming integral to the success of companies in nearly every field and industry. For those looking for an affordable solution that promotes automated understanding of big data analytics, consider Digital Reasoning’s flagship solution Synthesys.
Jasmine Ashton, September 24, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Analyzing Big Data in DNA to Find Diseases
September 20, 2012
Mass amounts of raw data cause problems for more fields than just computer science. Life scientists struggle to wade through the amounts of data surrounding sequencing human genes and genetic characteristics. However, according to “Computational Method for Pinpointing Genetic Factors That Cause Disease” on Science Daily, Researchers are Roswell Park Cancer Institute and the Center for Human Genome Variation at Duke University Medical Center have developed an approach for analyzing this data to quickly cull out relevant genetic patterns and find variants that lead to particular disorders.
The study is outlined in the September issue of The American Journal of Human Genetics. We learn:
“[Zhu, the paper’s first author, notes,] ‘We’re confident that our method can be applied to genome-wide association studies related to diseases for which there are no known causal variants, and by extension may advance the development of targeted approaches to treating those diseases.’
‘This approach helps to intergrade the large body of data available in GWASs with the rapidly accumulating sequence data,’ adds David B. Goldstein, […]Director of the Center for Human Genome Variation at DUMC and senior author of the paper.’”
The technological advancement allowing scientists to pinpoint such causal variants is fascinating. However, as this technology advances, we are left to wonder how insurers will begin to use these predictive methods. Could faulty genes be analyzed in the future to justify declining policies?
Andrea Hayden, September 20, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
VPI Taps Autonomy IDOL for Analytics
September 18, 2012
Autonomy vaunts its latest victory in “VPI Selects Autonomy, an HP Company, to Deliver Advanced Speech and Multichannel Analytics.” A global provider of workforce optimization solutions, VPI will soon embed Autonomy’s IDOL Server into its analytics tools VPI Empower and VPI Empower 911. The press release explains:
“Combining Autonomy IDOL with VPI’s context-directed interaction analytics gives enterprises and public safety organizations a more accurate and comprehensive understanding of all their communications activity. All calls to a help desk or emergency center can be automatically classified using VPI’s desktop analytics, which tags valuable data and events from CRM, ERP, CAD, helpdesk and other applications to recorded communications, to provide precise context of the conversations. This allows organizations to provide better and faster customer service and patient care. Managers can also apply speech analytics to any category of interest-such as repeat calls, high value sales, account cancellations or security breaches-increasing speed and accuracy of their search and analysis without having to listen to all calls.”
Headquartered in Camarillo, CA, VPI was founded in 1994. They supply customer experience and workforce optimization solutions for enterprises, trading floors, government agencies, and, perhaps most importantly, first responders. Let’s hear it for anything that makes their jobs faster and easier!
Autonomy, founded in 1996 and now owned by HP, offers solutions that use IDOL to tame mind-boggling amounts of unstructured data. The technology grew from research originally performed at Cambridge University, and now serves prominent public and private organizations around the world.
Cynthia Murrell, September 18, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
-
- Subscribe to Beyond Search
Feature archive
News archive
-
