Information Alchemy

Quotes

Quote of the Week

"Errors using inadequate data are much less than those using no data at all."

Charles Babbage

If you believe that doing stuff with data is the most fun you can have (at work), you too are an Information Anorak. Which probably means you read up on this data, information and direct marketing stuff. If you have come across quotes that seem to you to capture exactly the problems we are all struggling with or simply say things that need to be said, send them in to me. If they are not already in my vast library, I will add them, and in return you will get:

	An e-mail saying thank you
	The inestimable satisfaction of seeing your favourite quote turn up as Quote of the Week
	The envy of your friends who will now see you as learned and scholarly (possibly for the first time)
	The bafflement of your enemies, who will not know what you are on about, as they don't go in much for book larnin'

Send your favourite quotes to the Information Anorak

data quality

"Data supply doesn't create information. Information doesn't automatically lead to knowledge. Knowledge doesn't lead directly to action. Business action and impact are the goal."

"If a magic fairy instantly gave you absolutely all the information resources the company would ever need, do you think people would instantly know what to do with it and how to use it well?"

Peter G.W. Keen

data quality

"Information is at the heart of any marketing activity. Not only that: it's also the basis on which a company's marketing either succeeds or fails."

Regis McKenna

data quality

"What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention, and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it."

Herbert Simon

data quality

"As a rule, he or she who has the most information will have the greatest success in life."

Disraeli

data quality

"As I hurtled through space, one thought kept crossing my mind - every part of this capsule was supplied by the lowest bidder."

John Glenn

data quality

"Knowledge is of two kinds: we know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it."

Samuel Johnson

data quality

"The dissemination of new information is a controversial business, because new information is often surprising. Sometimes it is threatening to existing interests…."

J.L. King

data quality

"Realise that everything connects to everything else"

Leonardo da Vinci

data quality

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled."

Richard Feynman

data quality

"An e-business can't run without acurate data about its' customers and business partners, and that need is elevating data cleansing from an obscure, specialised technology to a core requirement for data warehousing, CRM and web-based commerce"

Mike Faden

data quality

" Technology usually provides a series of tradeoffs. Each asset is offset by a deficit…A major problem occurs when those who suffer from technology's defecits and those who benefit are not the same people."

Donald Norman

data quality

"If you have a bad workflow process and you don't automate it, you'll die a slow cheap death. And if you automate it, you'll die a fast expensive death"

Jim Cates

data quality

"Information Technology must be viewed from an ecological perspective. Information systems do not stand alone; they effect and are affected by the operational environment. Understanding how Information Technology 'fits' into the larger context is the key to its effective use"

Richard Rathe

data quality

"Most of the lessons learned in direct marketing decades ago have not been picked up in the online world...Just about anything that works in conventional Direct Marketing works online"

Drayton Bird, Keynote adddress, Technology For Marketing 2006

data quality

"A firm's customer information competency should be the single most important factor that determines a firm's core business objectives."

John McKean, Information Masters

data quality

"...enabling systems...enable smart firms to be smarter, and dumb firms to be dumber"

Nick Siragher, Carving Jelly

data quality

"…any given application can function perfectly well, even when the data behind it is bad. It is only when we attempt to reuse that data for another purpose that we discover how inaccurate, outdated or irrelevant it is, and by then it is usually too late"

Larry Burns

data quality

"For a list of all the ways technology has failed to improve the quality of life, please press three"

Alice Kahn

data quality

"I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I'm frightened of the old ones."

John Cage

data quality

"Good ideas are not adopted automatically. They must be driven into practice with courageous impatience."

Admiral Hyman G Rickover

data quality

Errors using inadequate data are much less than those using no data at all."

Charles Babbage

data quality

"It is very common to find that the data to support many of the business information needs is simply not available at the levels required, or that it is of such bad quality that it is impossible to use. Resolution of these types of issues often requires fundamental changes to business processes"

Alison Newell

data quality

"Above all get obsessed about data"

Jerry Yang, founder of Yahoo

data quality

"...an invaluable compendium of information on the most pressing challenge in business today"

Sean Kelly
Comhra

"At last! Something on data even an old Luddite like me can understand!"

Drayton Bird

"...a really useful resource to understanding all issues relating to data management"

Prof Derek Holder
Institute of
Direct Marketing

"...a down-to-earth, no-nonsense site designed to cover the new practices and theory of Information Management"

Simon Lawrence
Information Arts