Data for All

7 Derived data, synthetic data, and analytics

This chapter covers

• Data lineage—where does data comes from and what data is used to create new data
• The escalating hierarchy of data from raw data to data used in optimization
• The current state of data generation—beyond human-created data to machine-generated data
• An Analytics Maturity Model illustrating analytics from simple dashboards to optimization

It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.¹ 

—Mark Twain

People who watch and analyze technology for a living—technology analysts, journalists, editors, practitioners, academics—discuss whether data or analytics is more important, as if the two are separable. They can be examined in isolation, ...