There's no degree requirement to be called a data scientist. There is for one of the positions I am recruiting for. Even if there were, why would you exclude

There's no degree requirement to be called a data scientist. There is for one of the positions I am recruiting for. Even if there were, why would you exclude a B.S. or an M.S.? Because I am looking for someone with a Phd in Data Science. How stupid of me, for excluding people that don't have the skills I need for my job. You'd be stupid to market yourself as a data specialist when every startup is looking for a data scientist. I'd be stupid for hiring a data specialist, when what I am looking for is a data scientist. I'd be even stupider for hiring someone that is trying to pass themselves off as a data scientist with Phd, when they don't actually have one. I recently interviewed someone with "12 years production hadoop experience" (seriously), claiming to have a "data science Phd" (doesn't exist as such) and when asked "can you please explain the relationship between hbase, hadoop, and hdfs" (yes, there is a reason for asking this question in this way) I had to listen to essentially a salespitch for Hortonworks, and to be told "hdfs has nothing to do with hadoop" <-- this shit, many times a week.