Mapping and Conceptualizing Big Data and Its Value Across Issues and Domains

Abstract

In today’s world, the possibility to collect and analyze unprecedented quantities of data pertaining not only to the operation of private and public sectors, but also to the lives of individuals, bears the potential to employ the data as invaluable source of information, and possibly knowledge. The latter, in turn, may lead to innovation, and innovation-led sustainable growth and development of our societies. Inasmuch as the promise inherent in – what tends to be termed – big data is huge, so are also the caveats related to the prospect of exploiting the benefits of big data. In this chapter, it is argued that four challenges beset the possibility of effective and efficient use of big data today. These include: a substantial degree of ignorance as to what big data actually is; the challenge of obtaining quality data; the challenge of the utilization of big data in the decision-making process; and, finally, the twin ethical and legal challenge pertaining to the acquisition and the use of big data. It is also argued that the awareness of the existence of these caveats enables a critical insight into the promise big data brings about for our societies today. This chapter dwells on these issues.

Citation

Visvizi, A., Troisi, O. and Grimaldi, M. (2023), "Mapping and Conceptualizing Big Data and Its Value Across Issues and Domains", Visvizi, A., Troisi, O. and Grimaldi, M. (Ed.) Big Data and Decision-Making: Applications and Uses in the Public and Private Sector (Emerald Studies in Politics and Technology), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 15-25. https://doi.org/10.1108/978-1-80382-551-920231002