How BI and Data Analytics Professionals Used Twitter in October

Author: Amanda Brandon
Spotfire Blogging Team

Author: Amanda Brandon
Spotfire Blogging Team

It’s been one year since we brought you a recap of how BI and data analytics pros used Twitter in the last month. So much has happened in the month of October! We’re starting to see the preliminary 2012 predictions for the industry, new studies and new faces entering the social BI conversation. Let’s kick things off with a few awards.

Most Insightful

This month, we didn’t have any real contenders for “Best Twitter Handle” (although we’re always taking nominations related to data analytics and business intelligence), but we found a few Tweets worth sharing for their insights.

Carsten Rasmussen, CTO of Capgemini Denmark, brought us this real truth: “Social enterprises must measure customer influencing value in addition to traditional financial value.”

The late Steve Jobs apparently left a mark on everything he touched, including business intelligence. Ventana Research’s David Menninger shares how Jobs influenced his career and the advent of BI. He says, “I probably wouldn’t be in the software industry today if it wasn’t for that Apple II and VisiCalc.” Additionally, he points to Jobs’ contributions of the iPhone and iPad to the widespread acceptance of mobile BI. In his article, he writes:

“The iPhone and iPad transformed and invigorated the mobile BI market. They fundamentally changed the value of mobile devices, taking them beyond just reading and responding to email. Offered a rich user experience, employees were willing to buy their own devices and bring them along to work . . . Users wanted mobile BI, and BI vendors were forced to adapt their products to these new form factors.”

Most Retweeted

The data analytics community apparently appreciates “evidence-based” data analytics. This October goodie from the Spotfire blog gives some insights on how we have to “focus first on facts and analysis and not become overwhelmed by the flood of data that’s available to us.”

Hashtag of the Month

TDWI’s World Conference is happening this week and it’s our hashtag of the month. Here’s the #TDWI feed for your easy bookmarking and don’t forget to stop by the booth (#405) to see the new Spotfire Silver 2.0 and our iPad app. Read the press release here.

Interesting Toy for “Data Geeks”

This was retweeted over 57,000 times on Twitter, but the data analytics toy from the BBC is a fun coffee break distraction for data fans. You can use this tool to determine some serious need-to-know information – your number amongst the other 7 billion or so people in the world. (Be sure to enter your birth date as instructed or it won’t work.)

Why BI Needs More Design Focus

Peter O’Donnell, a lecturer on BI at Monash University in Australia, tweeted that his whitepaper relating social media’s effect on BI was available. You can find the whitepaper summary here. (It’s in French, but you can get the gist with your browser translate feature). This find led us over to Monash’s BI blog where we found this interesting post on the merits of bringing more design into the BI software development process. Interesting read.

The Menninger article mentioned earlier really brings this topic full circle. Apple’s focus on design was highly influential in the formation of our industry in the first place. Very interesting history here.

Studies, Predictions Galore

Dana Gardner is an independent analyst, blogger and podcaster offering insights on enterprise software. He makes our list for two reasons – a highly interesting blog and for bringing Twitter attention to Gartner’s list of technologies expected to have an increased impact on the enterprise, which includes “cloud computing, mobile devices, analytics tools for big data and ‘in-memory computing.’”

Additionally, Gartner predicts that “decisions and collaboration” will take an increased focus in analytics. The move is toward “simulation, optimization and other analytics, not simply information, to empower even more decision flexibility at the time and place of every business process action.”

Howard Dresner’s third mobile BI study became available for purchase on October 31^st. We also discovered that Dresner now has a members-only site dedicated to business intelligence. Members of the site will be able to access the full report in just two weeks. If you’re interested in a high level view of the study, you can find the table of contents and cover letter at his blog.

As always here’s a convenient list of people and organizations to follow:

@carstenrasmussn

@dmenningervr

@TDWI

@podonnel

@Dana_Gardner

@Gartner_inc

@HowardDresner