The document contains a collection of quotes related to big data alongside critical responses from Martyn Jones. Jones argues that many big data quotes are "dopey" and don't align with reality. He criticizes claims that big data is driving all trends, that the value of data can be calculated by its size, and comparisons of data to oil. Jones also questions whether statisticians will be the most desirable job and claims information can exist without underlying data.

1. Big Data?
Dopey Quotes?
Martyn Jones
goodstrat.com

2. “Big data is at the foundation of all the
megatrends that are happening today, from
social to mobile to cloud to gaming.”
"Boloney in a handcart going to hell! If there are
people who think that Big Data is anywhere other than
on the peripheral edge of a peripheral edge then they
clearly need to get out more often and listen to real
people.”
goodstrat.com

3. “Big data is not about the data”
"Say what? Big Data missionaries have always
primarily made it about the data, you know, the 3 or 4
or 10 Vs of Big Data and all that jazz. In fact one of the
shticks that the Big Data proselytizers have schlepped
around is that Data Warehouse can't do bigger data
because it can't handle the volumes. What they forget
to add is that if you first remove the wheat from the
chaff it becomes a non-issue."
goodstrat.com

4. “There were 5 exabytes of information created
between the dawn of civilization through 2003, but
that much information is now created every 2 days.”
"Yet another ‘dope’ who thinks that one can calculate
the value of data by simply weighing it? A 'sexed up'
version of my n exabytes of ignorance is just as good
as your 2 exabytes knowledge"
goodstrat.com

5. “Information is the oil of the 21st century, and
analytics is the combustion engine.”
"This assertion is so dopey that it defies the
conventional laws of stupid. For the best part of two
centuries we have appreciated the power of having the
right information and hoped that our enemies trusted
in our disinformation. But to compare this with the
historic and contemporary use and utility of energy
sources, well, it’s off the wall. In a word, the
comparison is vapid."
goodstrat.com

6. “I keep saying that the sexy job in the next 10
years will be statisticians, and I’m not kidding”
“What? When people state weird shit like this I am
very wary about asking for clarification."
goodstrat.com

7. “You can have data without information, but you
cannot have information without data.”
“Of course you can have information without data; it's
just that we usually associate information with the
availability of underlying data, which isn't always the
case.”
goodstrat.com

8. “Hiding within those mounds of data is knowledge that
could change the life of a patient, or change the world.”
“Sure! There's gold in them there hills… or not. Isn't
that right Madame Soleil?”
goodstrat.com

9. Errors using inadequate data are much less than those
using no data at all.”
“What? Probability might indicate that this claim
could possibly be erring on the wrong side of likely.
Apart from that, the bizarre and intellectually
questionable juxtaposition and conflation of this quote
with Big Data is somewhat embarrassing.”
goodstrat.com

10. “To call in the statistician after the experiment is done may
be no more than asking him to perform a post-mortem – he
may be able to say what the experiment died of.”
“To call in the statistician after the experiment is done
may be no more than asking him to perform a post-
mortem – he may be able to say what the experiment
died of.”
goodstrat.com

11. Without big data, you are blind and deaf in the middle of a
freeway”
“Has the Cosa Nostra gone into Big Data and Data
Science now? Funny, but this looks more like a threat
than an observation. Unless of course the observation
was the result of forty ‘doobie snacks’.”
goodstrat.com

12. Big Data!
Dopey Quotes!
Martyn Jones
goodstrat.com