The explosion of social networks, combined with the unstoppable spread of smartphones, justifies the fact that one of the recurring terms in the world of innovation, marketing, and information technology in recent years is big data. This term indicates data produced in large quantities, with considerable speed, and in the most diverse formats, the processing of which requires technologies and resources that go well beyond the conventional systems of management and storage of data. But what is enclosed in this term?
In a widely quoted article, The Age of Big Data, Steve Lohr (a technology reporter for The New York Times) explained big data in this way: