Big data works only for those who hype it

It's probably prudent, in the absence of recent research on big data's effect on company performance, to be agnostic about it

Margrethe Vestager, the Europen Union’s competition commissioner challenging tech giants on several fronts, has opened another: “Big data.”

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, she singles out data as an important competitive advantage that should be more seriously considered in antitrust reviews and investigations. Buying the mostly groundless big data hype is, unfortunately, often the flip side of a healthy concern with privacy.

“In some areas, these data are extremely valuable,” she told The Wall Street Journal. “They can foreclose the market — they can give the parties that have them immense business opportunities that are not available to others.”