Big data is the massive amounts of data that companies collect, store and analyze to gain insights and make better decisions. It's like having a crystal ball that can predict the future, but instead of magic, it uses math and computers to find patterns in all the noise.

How to use it in a sentence

• I can't believe our marketing team wants to use big data to target ads for our new product. I thought we were trying to make the world a better place, not just sell more stuff!

• Our CEO keeps talking about how big data is going to revolutionize our industry, but I'm pretty sure he just read that in a Forbes article and has no idea what it actually means.

If you actually want to learn more...

• Thinking about Big Data by Martin Fowler provides a great overview of the key areas where data management is changing, from data extraction to visualization.

• Data-Driven Domination: How Top Companies Leverage Data for Competitive Advantage by Leon Palafox explores how companies like John Deere and Amazon are using big data as a strategic resource to gain a competitive edge.

• The NoSQL Distilled book by Pramod Sadalage and Martin Fowler dives into the rise of NoSQL databases and schemaless data structures, which are key components of many big data architectures.

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