For industry peers, especially fresh grads buying into the current Big Data/AI/Machine Learning hype cycle, partially underway, at a very macro level (as technologies take time to permeate through institutional structures, cultures and need to switch personal behaviour as per the Social Construction of Technology thesis and other technology diffusion frameworks) that Big Data, is more a process to turn everyday processes in to ‘data points’ and is not a silver bullet as Biotechnology a decade back and Sustainability a few years ago.

Every hype cycle fades away, with the realization that profits are not delivered and the next big thing on the horizon crops up. Our fetish with the future of the future and evolving values of the constantly modern, breathes life in to these ‘new’ technologies. The questions will be answered by big data or small. The proof of the pudding will be when any off this Big or small data will solve entrenched issues of the day deeply intertwined in vested power structures.