As I watched the coverage of the 2014 Consumer Electronic Show (CES) held in Las Vegas, Nevada last week, I reflected back to a recent article which discussed data analysis as it related to managing employees, as well as employee learning and development. This article was a special report in the January 2014 issue of Talent Management magazine.
The article noted that large amounts of data, termed “Big Data” is the watchword in our global economy among computer and IT professionals. While the Talent Management article related to employees, it could just as well have related to our world in general from a data standpoint.
As a refresher, the following table relates data amounts (all values are approximate):
- · Kilobyte – 1,000 bytes
- · Megabyte – 1,000 kilobytes
- · Gigabyte – 1,000 megabytes
- · Terabyte – 1,000 gigabytes
- · Petabytes – 1,000 terabytes
- · Exabyte – 1,000 petabytes
- · Zettabyte – 1,000 exabytes
- · Yottabyte – 1,000 zettabytes
To make sense of the amount of data related to the values shown above, the following were noted in the Talent Management magazine article.
- 1 Gigabyte is equivalent to about seven minutes of high-definition video and two gigabytes is equivalent to about 20 yards of books on a shelf.
- 1 Exabyte is equivalent to about 250 million DVDs and five exabytes would just about cover a transcript of every word spoken in human history.
- 1 Petabyte is equal to 20 million four-drawer filing cabinets filled with text or 13.3 years of high-definition video.
To envision the challenges which may lie ahead, consider the smart phone revolution taking place today. Smart phones are taking the cell phone market by storm. This “portable, always connected” world is the new normal, even in developing countries. More people, globally, are connected via cell phones than by the 20th century technology of the telephone and copper wires known as “land lines.”
So what does all of this have to do with the CES 2014 show in Las Vegas? New electronic products including curved big-screen ultra-high definition televisions, Windows 8.1, Apple and Android tablets, cell phones with high-definition screens and cameras and numerous “wearable electronics were all introduced to an increasingly digital driven world. Other digital devices such as appliances and even automobiles were demonstrated at this show. All of these devices go to the core of the “big-data” challenge.
As an example, cell phones, such as the Nokia Lumina 1020 with 40 mega-pixel capability, rival the photo taking ability of many high end digital cameras. Think of the megabytes and gigabytes of data which are transferred from these marvels of technology in both image and video format to tablets, laptops and internet social media sites on an annual basis. As a new grandparent, I can testify to a definite increase in photo production and transmission in our family to Facebook and other social media sites, as well as an increase in the amount of photos on my external USB storage drive.
One of the devices introduced at CES 2014 which caught my attention (not that all of them are not fascinating) was introduced by Belkin.
“A Belkin Crock-Pot WeMo Smart Slow Cooker ($99.99) is displayed during a CES media preview event. The crock-pot can be controlled remotely via a smartphone and should be available in March.”
This new crock pot allows a user to control the utensil using a cell phone. Presumably, one could “call into” your home network and turn the crock-pot on or off while still at the office, as well as monitor the progress of the utensil. When you arrived home, your dinner would be ready. The following is from the Belkin press release before the CES 2014 show.
LAS VEGAS – January 8, 2013 – Belkin, creator of people-inspired technology products, today announced WeMo SMART, a program designed to bring its simple, Wi-Fi based WeMo home automation platform to new brands and a wider variety of household devices. Jarden Consumer Solutions ("JCS"), a leading provider of global consumer products brands, will be the first company to partner with WeMo SMART for its Sunbeam®, Crock-Pot®, Mr. Coffee® and Oster® brands.
Operating this crock-pot does not sound like a data intensive process on the surface. However, it does require a control mechanism on the pot as well as, such as a home based WI-FI network connected to the Internet. It also requires an application which resides on the phone itself. This application is the programming which allows the phone and the crock pot and other home appliances to “communicate.”
These cell phone applications, termed “apps,” are relatively small amounts of programming which take advantage of the features and functions of the phone to perform a task. Apps are generally separated into three categories, tool apps, games apps and marketing apps. Clearly, the app for the crock-pot would be a tool app.
However, this is where it gets complicated. There were an estimated 800,000 “apps” available on each of the Google and Apple stores as of the end of 2013 (see mobithinking.com). The apps are only limited by the phone, tablet or computer technology, the technology which can be built into things like appliances and other objects, the total bandwidth available and finally the storage capacity available for the apps and necessary data. Examples of apps include controlling your smart television and playing games across the internet.
While Microsoft was late to the “app game,” it introduced the Windows 8 operating system in 2012/2013. This operating system is able to take advantage of these apps across different platforms, desktop, laptop, tablet and cell phone. Microsoft had over 143,000 “apps” in its store as of January 12, 2014 (winbeta.com).
Developing and writing apps has become a mini-economy unto itself. While many “apps” are free to install and use, most are not. Many of the games and other tools cost a few dollars or more. This is the evolution and monetization of program development and writing.
Think of our world, and the data, band width and processing requirements as our phones and computers start to communicate with stoves, dishwashers and other everyday appliances. It is not inconceivable that your refrigerator will communicate with the local grocery store to resupply any food which you are out of or you need for a specific recipe. Your refrigerator will need to store and compile data on what is currently in stock, how old it is, the expiration date and what you might need for a specific recipe. Whether this is on a storage device in the refrigerator, on a device in your home Wi-Fi network or on an external data storage unit, it will still increase your data storage requirements. The majority of the new consumer electronics at the CES 2014 show will increase the use of your home Wi-Fi network, as well as the more general networks of providers such as Verizon, AT&T and others.
The simple “apps” of the new tablet, and smartphone revolution take on a much larger significance. They are the tip of the iceberg. Our storage capabilities will need to increase both locally, in our homes, and globally.
For example, terabyte sized storage drives are now common in very slim USB form factors. These drives can be connected to tablets, ultra books and laptops. Most people use this type of drive, as well as flash drives to store their data today. Soon, instead of terabytes, these drives will be storing petabyte and exabyte quantities of data. These work for home storage, often acting as “network attached” or “external attached” storage devices shared by multiple computers, laptops, tablets and cell phones.
In addition, to share, process and utilize this vast quantity of data beyond our home computing devices and our local Wi-Fi communication providers such as Verizon, AT&T and others have to increase the amount of bandwidth we can access globally.
Storage “in the cloud” is the new business model for communications providers and most large international companies. Emerson says there are 509,147 data centers worldwide, with 285.8 million square feet of space. Or in more familiar terms, there’s enough data center space in the world to fit 5,955 football fields as of 2011 according to datacenterknowledge.com. Once you start considering the amount of data we process today, you get a sense of the explosion which is taking place today. It was estimated in 2011 there was 1.2 trillion gigabytes (GB) of data created, equivalent to 75 billion 16 GB iPods. That’s more than enough for every person on earth to own 10 iPods (source datacenterknowledge.com). All that data has to live somewhere, driving the need for more data center facilities.
To store all of this “big data”, data centers are being constructed at an increasing rate globally. In the next few years, most of the data previously stored on local servers in the back rooms of many businesses will be stored in these data centers. Microsoft, Amazon and Google, to name a few are positioning themselves to profit from this model in a big way.
These data centers allow massive quantities of data to be “mined” (analyzed and manipulated) which can yield everything from customer buying patterns to more intimate details about consumers in general. All of which can point toward additional customers and thus more revenue. Just as you will be able to tell your crock-pot to finish cooking dinner so it will be hot and ready when you arrive home, your local grocery store may be able to suggest recipes and specific ingredients for you to try based on your buying habits and tastes using a connection with your refrigerator.
Recent stories about the National Security Agency (NSA) collecting, manipulating and analyzing huge quantities of data from computers and cell phones worldwide is one of the potential downsides to this “cloud storage” concept. Security and protection of data may be one of the fastest growing fields in computer and internet technology for years to come.
So, the point is that many of the consumer electronics that previewed in Las Vegas at the CES 2014 show are part of an increasing revolution. As you can see, even the smallest, seemingly insignificant use such as those required by many of the new “wearable” electronics contribute to the massive increase in global electronic data. Computers, technology and electronics continue to change the world in ways that are increasingly unexpected, both for good and for bad. One thing is certain, the amount of electronic data in the world will definitely increase on a per person basis from today’s terabytes to tomorrow’s exabytes and beyond.
H. Court Young
January 12, 2014
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