隨著電腦科技的發展，計算能力不再是像以前那樣的“奢侈品”。現在的我們就彷如暢泳在一個巨大的資料水庫，而這個資料庫包羅永珍：從繁忙時段一個明尼蘇達州小鎮的表現至在葉門成功使用無人飛機轟炸的可能性。大資料的到來意味著公司，機構以及政府等可以同過收集，挖掘並利用這些龐大的資料區完成神奇的事情。
讓我們看看神奇的大資料如何改變世界：
1.資料化身致命武器：
資訊作為大資料時代最有效最具殺傷力的武器同時也正在被大量用於該時代的軍備競賽，但現今的軍事技術資料來源正受限於衛星，無人飛行旗以及更多傳統方式得到的資料。美國國防部啟動一項名為XDA他的方案，其作為奧巴馬政府釋出的大資料倡議的一部分主要致力於以2.5億美元研發一個分析大資料的系統。隨著越來越多的有效運算，美軍能夠將PB級的資料運用到尖端優勢上，例如讓無人轟炸機變得前所未有的智慧以及致命。
2.拯救地球：
除了讓捕食者無人機更有威力和增加零售利潤外，大資料更能造福世界。以開源的大資料平臺Google Earth引擎為例，研究人員可利用它繪製出第一張莫斯科森林的高解析度的地圖。如果僅利用傳統的電腦計算方法繪製需要3年時間，對比之下使用Google Earth僅需一天時間。
像這種大規模的資料集合能夠讓人類在系統層面上理解生態危機。我們知道越多地球生態系統以及天氣形態變化資料，就越容易模型化未來環境的變遷，因而也能夠在我們力所能及的時候去阻止不好的轉變發生。
3.預測購物趨勢：
消費者的購物趨勢能夠在以前的購物記錄大資料探勘中得出，銷售公司不論大少均有可能預測到你需要買什麼，他們甚至比你自己更懂你。因而從消費者當前購物資料中從大資料中能夠獲得大利潤。網上零售商如亞馬遜正在大量收集我們的購物以及網上購物資料，甚至線下零售商也開始緊跟這一趨勢著手收集消費者的消費資料。一些聰明的公司看準這點，以RetailNext為例，它是為Brookstone 以及American Apparel等公司提供購物者瀏覽以及購物時的錄影記錄。 RetailNext將一個購買者在店鋪移動的軌跡轉化為上萬資料點，就可以得到購物者在店內瀏覽商品的移動過程，停留點以及其與銷售的相關性。
4.加速科學研究發展速度：
一直以來資料都是科學發現的支柱，現在由於大資料的發展以及高運算力的支援，科研步伐也正飛速向前。
以人類歷史上科學成就指標性的 人類基因組計劃為例，當時花費達30億美元，耗時13年才完成大約含25000個基因的人類基因組測序及分析。若應用當代先進的資料收集分析方法，使用一個如U盤大小的裝置區完成這項工作僅需幾小時就足矣，其花費也僅僅是1000美元。
5.大資料導致更大的隱私威脅：
你也許只是從大“據”考慮，但是這句格言不再像以前一樣好用了。若說大資料與廣度攸關是正確無誤的，但是深度對大資料來說也是同等重要的。
網路巨頭如Facebook和Google不單單積累了廣度上的資料—大量的使用者（FB擁有9.55億使用者），他們對深度上的資料–使用者（使用網路的）資料也瞭如指掌。譬如，他們知道你搜尋的內容，你點選了什麼頁面以及你認識什麼人。最大的網路大鱷擁有足以讓他們無所不知的大量的資料。
在這裡的技術力量，文化進步和利潤的相交之處，有一件事是確定的：資料越大責任越大（蜘蛛俠中槍）。
下面是英文版本：
5 Ways ‘Big Data’ Is Changing the World
Computers are leaner, meaner and cheaper than ever before. With computing power no longer at a premium, we’re swimming in numbers that describe everything from how a small town in Minnesota behaves during rush hour to the probability of a successful drone strike in Yemen.
The advent of so-called “big data” means that companies, governments and organizations can collect, interpret and wield huge stores of data to an amazing breadth of ends. From shoe shopping to privacy concerns, here’s a look at five ways “big data” is changing the world:
1. Data as a deadly weapon: The traditional battlefield has dissolved into thin air. In the big data era, information is the deadliest weapon and leveraging massive amounts of it is this era’s arms race. But current military tech is buckling under the sheer weight of data collected from satellites, unmanned aircraft, and more traditional means.
As part of the Obama administration’s “Big Data Initiative,” the Department of Defense launched XDATA, a program that intends to invest $25 million toward systems that analyze massive data sets in record time. With more efficient number crunching, the U.S. military can funnel petabytes of data toward cutting edge advances, like making unmanned drones smarter and more deadly than ever.
Related: Surprising things you could learn from sequencing your DNA
2. Saving the Earth: Beyond powering predator drones and increasing retail revenue, big data can do a literal world of good. Take Google Earth Engine, an open source big data platform that allowed researchers to map the first high-resolution map of Mexico’s forests. The map would have taken a traditional computer over three years to construct, but using Google Earth Engine’s massive data cloud it was completed in the course of a day.
Massive sets of data like this can help us understand environmental threats on a systemic level. The more data we have about the changing face of the earth’s ecosystems and weather patterns, the better we can model future environmental shifts — and how to stop them while we still can.
3. Watching you shop: Big data can mean big profits. By understanding what you want to buy today, companies large and small can figure out what you’ll want to buy tomorrow — maybe even before you do.
Online retailers like Amazon scoop up information about our shopping and e-window shopping habits on a huge scale, but even brick and mortar retailers are starting to catch on. A clever company called RetailNext helps companies like Brookstone and American Apparel record video of shoppers as they browse and buy.
By transforming a single shopper’s path into as many as 10,000 data points, companies can see how they move through a store, where they pause and how that tracks with sales.
Related: The Future of Shopping: How technology will change the way you buy
4. Scientific research in overdrive: Data has long been the cornerstone of scientific discovery, and with big data — and the big computing power necessary to process it — research can move at an exponentially fast clip.
Take the Human Genome Project, widely considered to be one of the landmark scientific accomplishments in human history. Over the course of the $3 billion project, researchers analyzed and sequenced the roughly 25,000 genes that make up the human genome in 13 years. With today’s modern methods of data collection and analysis, the same process can be completed in hours — all by a device the size of a USB memory stick and for less than $1,000.
5. Big data, bigger privacy concerns: You might just be a number in the grand scheme of things, but that adage isn’t as reassuring as it used to be. It’s true that big data is about breadth, but it’s about depth, too.
Web mega-companies like Facebook and Google not only scoop up data on a huge number of users — 955 million, in Facebook’s case — but they collect an incredible depth of data as well. From what you search and where you click to who you know (and who they know, and who they know), the web’s biggest players own data stockpiles so robust that they border on omniscient.
Where technological power, cultural advancement and profit intersect, one thing’s clear: with big data comes even bigger responsibility.
自：36大資料