Open data has several definitions but our preferred one at Data To Value is from the Open Data Institute – ‘Open data is data that anyone can access, use and share.’ Simple really but there is a follow-on – ‘For data to be considered ‘open’, it must be published in an accessible…

So the question is…when do you sample and when do you not?  And does it even matter anymore in the world of big data?  

As I’ll lay out here, in most cases today there is no point in wasting energy worrying about it.  As long as a few basic criteria are met, do whatever you prefer.

First, let’s take care of the cases where sampling just won’t work.  If you need to find the top 100 spending customers, you can’t do that with a sample.  You’ll have to look at…