We all use metaphors, but marketing is an entirely different level of non-straight-talk, which is fine. It’s their job! But the technical experts who are selling must be able to decipher it for customers, especially to the technical leaders at accounts.

When “data” became a four letter word.. Information, Analytics, Cloud, AI, what next..

Decades ago the term for IT was “data processing”, and as Information Technology went went into vogue, the word “data” started it’s decline in the IT lexicon. Data became “information” and the word “data” became non-PC. It’s subtle, but “data” became “information”, which eventually morphed into “analytics”. Of course analytics is different than a DBMS, although it’s part of analytics. But, again, data had to be called “analytics”, and there were a few stops along the way with other names, and today everything that resembles “data” is called AI, Artificial Intelligence. Of course, the term “digital transformation” is thrown in every so often for good measure. And while all of this was going on, the word Cloud had to be used in every other sentence of an IT conversation for that last decade and a half.

It never ends, like the word “verticals”. Whenever someone doesn’t know what to say in a business meeting but feels compelled to say something, they bring up the damn “verticals”. The semantics and twisting of words that occurs through all aspects of life is endless. For laughs about how the press and politicians torture language, watch this: George Carlin Speaks to the National Press Club