"The Data Explosion Makes Storage Tech Exciting" Response

            Jim Kerstetter’s article, published in the New York Times, explains the significance of the new “storage ‘box’” created by Pure Storage. The box, which Kerstetter describes as “look[ing] a bit like a refrigerator,” has the capability to store the data equivalent of billions of large books. This creates room for unimaginable quantities of data to be created and stored more easily than has ever been possible before.

             The thing that makes this new technology so shocking is the size. We have been making enormous strides in recent history with storing our data in smaller and simpler ways. What used to be stored on a computing device the size of a bedroom can now be held on a cell phone. However, a breakthrough of this scale is really notable.  On their website, Pure Storage advertises their products as “a full cloud under your desk” (Purestorage.com). One customer was even quoted as saying, “we went from 50 racks of disk down to five racks of Pure Storage” (Purestorage.com). This company is following the modern trend of making everything more compact, and they’re doing so in a big way.

            Another important point the article makes is the new data that will be created following the Pure Storage product release. It was estimated that as much as 44 zettabytes of data could be generated from the storage box by the year 2020 (Kerstetter).  To put that into perspective, every cell phone in the world combined create 18 exabytes (one thousand exabytes is the equivalent of one zettabyte) of data a month (Kerstetter).

            Kerstetter makes the case that this new technology will make data exciting for the average person. Data storing technology has never been the topic of thrilling conversation in most circles, but this could change that. Everyone in the modern world is connected and interacts with data in some way. The fact that a person can now have the storage capability of a cloud in his or her own home is astounding, and should be appreciated by everyone.

            I wish the article had gone into more detail about the release of the storage box and how it will be accessible to the public. It’s unclear whether the boxes will be available to everyone or just businesses. It would also have been nice if the article had explained the amount of data better. The data capability is only described in relation to books, which is not always a clear comparison to everyone. Finally, I wish the article gave more information about Pure Storage itself. I was left wondering if the company was new, if their technology is new, or if they have been working on this for a while.

Works Cited

Kerstetter, Jim. “The Data Explosion Makes Storage Tech Exciting.” The New York Times. 15 March 2016. Web.

URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/16/technology/the-data-explosion-makes-storage-tech-exciting.html

Purestorage.com. Pure Storage. 2016. Web. 12 Apr. 2016.

URL: https://www.purestorage.com/products.html