Copenhagen1

Metadata, Models and the Magic of Meaning, Copenhagen, Feb 9, 2017

Dr. Barry Devlin spends and afternoon exploring how meaning is driving changes in the use and value of metadata and models, and paving the way for algorithms in decision making.

The questions of metadata and models have plagued data warehousing, business intelligence and analytics since their earliest beginnings in the 1980s. While (almost) everybody is agreed on their necessity, few businesses have invested heavily in them and even fewer projects have delivered measurable value. Meanwhile, software vendors have also struggled to develop and market viable tools. With big data, NoSQL and the Internet of Things (IoT) rampant, coupled with the emergence of artificial intelligence in all areas of decision making support, the time has arrived to reopen this Pandora’s Box and explore how to make metadata and models central to decision making and to add real meaning to the data now being gathered in ever-increasing volumes.

Based on a more holistic understanding of how humans within organisations reach decisions, the limitations of real-world data and current modelling techniques, and the rapid growth of algorithmic automation and augmentation of decision making, Dr. Barry Devlin offers guidance on how reimage decision making support:

  • The reality of business decision making today—from intuition to algorithms—is far wider than any prior conception that drives today’s BI tools
  • Reinventing data modelling in the modern world of big data and IoT, but not forgetting traditional business data
  • A new name for metadata and a new model for meaning
  • Preparing for the (very near) future of autonomous decision making machines and cognitive computing