IEEE Spectrum

As new big data technologies advance and the challenges of extracting meaning from these massive data sets shift, it seems likely computer scientists will need an entirely new vocabulary to define these various trends. For example, big data enthusiasts sometimes categorize storage units as "brontobytes," each of which adds up to 1,000 trillion terabytes. A unit of 1,000 brontobytes is called a "geobyte." Accompanying the new lexicon of big data storage units are new terms for data professionals, which include specialists in building data models, or data architects; managers of data sources, or data stewards/custodians; translators of data into visual form, or data visualizers; and those who change how a company does business based on analyzing company data, or data change agents. Moreover, a new kind of journalism, data journalism or data-driven journalism, is emerging to apply statistics, programming, and other digital data and tools to generate or mold news stories. To read further, please visit http://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/software/beyond-just-big-data.