Big data, the global village engine

“We must get used to the idea that in the near future, the big data that was at the beginning of our history the only concern of census agents will be a reality in our daily lives.” Computer engineers Rafael Caballero and Enrique Martin confirmed in the book Big Data Basics (recently posted by Catarata) It does nothing but capture a process that is already adapting all sectors of society, From the economy to our daily lifefrom culture or health to the smallest act of consumption.

media stream

A flick of our mobile phone, the track we leave online, public transit ticket validation, credit card purchases… We live in a world that never stops generating and generating data. But why is this flow so important? “The ultimate goal of big data is not to collect data but to aggregate it Extract useful information Of them explain Caballero and Martin. Once stored, the next step is to extract new information, its ultimate goal.”

thanks for the big dataData is converted into knowledge and facilitates decision making. We experience it, sometimes without even being aware of it, in map apps, in targeted ads, In the series of recommendations, in medical diagnostics, in the detection of fraud, and, of course, in the content of social networks.

“Big data affects culture. With the mass adoption of metaverses, we will enjoy immersive experiences.” Elena Gill (Telefonica Tech)

In this vein, Elena Gil, Global Director of Internet of Things and Big Data Products at Telefónica Tech, expresses herself, for which big data is so essential in the digital world: “Organizations that decide not to adopt these solutions lose the opportunity to transform information input A business asset You will be at a distinctly disadvantageous competitive position. We should not talk in the future but in the present.”

Namely, Telefónica is one of the leaders in the use and development of big data, both as a user (it has been applying data analytics in strategic decision-making for ten years now) and as a service provider Companies and Institutions Through Telefónica Tech such as INE, Mahou San Miguel, Torre Outlet Zaragoza and Highways England.

new model

Gill remembers that Big Data “was born from the Internet, or rather from the Internet. The truth is that the seed of what we know today as Big Data occurred in 2004 at the hands of two people. google engineerswho proposed a new data management model.

Culture is one of the sectors where big data has the greatest impact. The way culture is consumed has definitely changed. “The beginning is because when we open any content platform, each of us receives personal suggestions Depending on our tastes, something wouldn’t have been possible without big data. In turn, the studios produced these same content based on information collected from tens of millions of users,” says Gill, for whom AI is a closely related tool with big data.

Artworks

“We can say that AI It is the engine and the big data is gasoline. AI needs access to large amounts of information and this is where big data comes in.” Not surprisingly, it has developed the ability to create artworks in Different specialities From novel to painting through music: “Generative art plays an essential role in the development of the NFTs market.”

The horizon for this cultural inertia will always be, according to Telefónica Tech’s Global Director of Internet of Things and Big Data Products, “the massive adoption of metaverseWhere, thanks to artificial intelligence and other technologies such as 5G, we will enjoy the same first-person culture with immersive experiences.”

The Internet of things

Are there limits, then, in this unstoppable process? “It will be determined by the available information and the evolution of technology, which, in practice, we could say is equivalent to having no limits. In addition, as we have said, big data is being improved by other related technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Cloud Computing, Computing, Internet of Things, and Blockchain etc. ”, notes Gill, who also needs to think about how to put these technologies at the service of society and the development of people: the digital pact in which we impose ourselves an obligation to the responsible and ethical use of these technologies, so that nothing we develop can cause any harm. Not only to our customers, But for the societies of the countries in which the group is located.”

Algorithms

In conclusion, Caballero and Martín point out that the key to any current machine learning project is to have high-quality data in sufficient quantities, containing the necessary information and to name it correctly: “In the field of data science that attempts to apply these methods to solve real problems It is said that “data are algorithms”. What this expression means is that the success of these projects depends not so much on software, which is a set of technologies already developed, so much on getting good data.”

Perhaps the global village has reached a moment of maximum development, a state in which there is no Marshall McLuhan can dream. The technology offered by the digital world, and big data and its possibilities, have now made information one of the most valued assets by humans.

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