On Data

What Is Data? - BeyeNETWORK: "At this point we have thought through some of the elements in the starter definition of data being 'the stored representation of a fact.' More elements remain, especially whether we are even justified in having the term 'fact' in the starter definition. That will have to wait for another article. However, we can see that 'data' has been used, and is still used, to mean many things The 'data' of data management has only one of these meanings. It is symbols stored in a medium that can be read only by some form of technology that can relate these symbols to other symbols according to rules ultimately provided by humans. Not very elegant prose perhaps, but hopefully a step closer to a definition of data."