Big data in 2013: what to expect.

• Position: BIG DATA

Forrester Research's Mike Gautlieri recently shared his predictions for big data in 2013. He narrowed in on four key themes, but the underlying message for enterprises, he contended, is "opportunity."

1. Companies will realize that "big data" means ALL of their data. Some define big data by how it can be measured in terms of volume, velocity, and variety. The flaw in this definition, contends Guiltier, is that it is "not an actionable, complete definition for IT and business professionals. He suggests a more pragmatic definition: "Big Data is the frontier of a firm's ability to store, process, and access (SPA) all the data it needs to operate effectively, make decisions, reduce risks, and serve customers." Furthermore, it will continue to reside in all kinds of data architectures, including enterprise data warehouses, application databases, file systems, cloud storage, Hadoop, and others.

2. The algorithm wars will begin. Organizations are coming to realize that they "must use predictive and descriptive analytics to find no obvious information to discover value in the data." Advanced analytics, Gautier explains, uses advanced statistical, data mining, and machine-learning algorithms to dig deeper to find patterns that you can't see...