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Big Data is just that - big. But, it's a term that is largely misunderstood and difficult to explain.

I'm going to say something rather controversial. Big data, as people understand it today, is just a bigger version of small data. Fundamentally, what we're doing with data has not changed; there's just more of it.

We get more data about people than any other data company gets about people, about anything - and it's not even close. We're looking at what you know, what you don't know, how you learn best. The big difference between us and other big data companies is that we're not ever marketing your data to a third party for any reason.

Big data has been used by human beings for a long time - just in bricks-and-mortar applications. Insurance and standardized tests are both examples of big data from before the Internet.

Most of 'big data' is a fraud because it is really 'dumb data.'

I am completely opposed to the concept of big data.

The people who are thinking most about big data right now are corporations and governments.

Big data is mostly about taking numbers and using those numbers to make predictions about the future. The bigger the data set you have, the more accurate the predictions about the future will be.

Nobody has really grasped yet the great wealth that can be made selling data over the Web. There are 100 million potential customers out there.

There are a number of fascinating stories included in 'The Human Face of Big Data' that represent some of the most innovative applications of data that are shaping our future.