Big Data Gets a New Term: DarkCyber Had to Look This One Up
April 2, 2020
In our feed this morning (April 1, 2020) we skipped over the flood of news about Zoom (a Middle Kingdom inspired marvel), the virus stories output by companies contributing their smart software to find a solution), and the trend of Amazon bashing (firing a worker who wanted to sanitize a facility and Amazon’s organizational skills are wobbling).
What stopped our scanning eyes was “Why Your Business May Be on a Data-Driven Coddiwomple.” DarkCyber admits that one of our team write a story for an old school publisher which used the word “cuculus” in its title “Google in the Enterprise 2009: The Cuculus Strategy.” A “cuculus,” as you probably know, gentle reader, is a remarkable bird, sort of a thief.
But Coddiwomple? That word means travel in a purposeful manner to a vague definition. Most of the YouTube train ride and the Kara and Nate trips qualify. Other examples include the aimless wandering of enterprise search vendors who travel to the lands of customer service, analytics, business process engineering, and only occasionally returning to their home base of the 50 year old desert of proprietary enterprise search.
What’s the point of “Why Your Business May Be on a Data-Driven Coddiwomple”? DarkCyber believes the main point is valid:
In practical terms the lack of clarity on the starting point can involve a lack of vision into what the specific objectives of the team are, or what human resources and skills are already in house. Meanwhile, the diverse and siloed stakeholders in a “destination” for the data-driven endeavor may all have slightly different ideas on what the result should be, leading to a divergent and fuzzy path to follow.
In DarkCyber’s lingo, these data and analytics journeys are just hand waving and money spending.
Are businesses and other entities data driven?
Ho ho ho. Most organizations are not sure what the heck is going on. The data are easy to interpret, and no fancy, little understood analytics system is needed to figure out that an iceberg has nicked the good ship Silicon Lollipop.
There are interesting uses of data and clever applications of systems and methods that are quite old.
Like the cuculus, opportunism is important. The coddiwomple is a secondary effect. The cuculus gets into a company’s nest and raises money consumers. When the money suckers are bigger, each flies to another nest and the cycle repeats.
Data driven is a metaphor for doing something even though results are often difficult to explain: Higher costs, increased complexity, and an inability to adapt to the business environment.
I support the cuculus inspired consultants. The management of the nest can enjoy the coddiwomple as they seek a satisfying place to begin again.
Stephen E Arnold, April 2, 2020
Comments
-
- Subscribe to Beyond Search
Feature archive
News archive
-
