> big data is more about a form of non-relational data that updates very quickly, doesn't need joins, needs high availability You're talking about NoSQL actual

> big data is more about a form of non-relational data that updates very quickly, doesn't need joins, needs high availability You're talking about NoSQL actually. Interestingly, I find that big data is normally synonymous with the unstructured data that updates very frequently, doesn't need joins, etc that you speak of. Structured data in large businesses, such as general ledgers, sales orders, purchase orders, etc. is generally quite fast. The only problem in that area today is getting that data out into complex reporting. It requires a lot of processing (either routine or manual) to get it into an optimized format. Big data came about because companies like FB, Google, Twitter, pretty much any online analytics company, AirBnb, etc. are crunching large sets of behavioral events. (user clicked this button) Outside of those use cases, data just doesn't grow as fast as the marketeers of Big Data claim it is.