By Anita Loomba, Digital Marketing Specialist 

For 'House of Cards,' Using Big Data to Guarantee Its Popularity 

NYTimes writer, David Carr, discusses how Netflix utilized big data to determine the popularity of their new series, ‘House of Cards.’ The company has 33 million subscribers worldwide, with each user having a different experience based on their viewing behavior. The company also looks at 30 million plays a day, three million searches, as well as examines the times of day when shows are on and the devices customers use. With such valuable data, Netflix is able to predict what customers will like or love next, and the ‘House of Cards’ is their golden example.

One in four cellcos lack big data plan 

A new research report from Analysys Mason has found that among the top communication service providers (CSPs), 27% of them have no strategy for big data analytics this year. With the vast amount of data available about telco customers, this is a missed opportunity for many companies. The report also estimates that CSPs have the ability to increase their net profit margins by 12% with good cross-sell marketing using big data. 

Etsy Gets Crafty with Big Data 

Over at Network World, Ann Bednarz, discusses how Etzy has found success in utilizing people and technology when working with data. The company collects vasts amounts of data, and as site traffic has grown, so has their analytical capabilities. Etsy has been working towards using big data to encourage changes that not only impact the bottom line, but also helps improve the experience for the 800K craftspeople that use their tools. 

Facebook engineers identify Graph Search's big data challenges 

Since Facebook’s Graph Search launch, the company has come across a stumbling block: sifting through an excess of data. The company has come forward with the fact that they currently don’t have the processing power to sift through the millions of connections to perform the search – and that the graph search is still in beta form. Eventually Facebook would like to incorporate additional metrics for advanced search. >