David Cummings on Startups

Never Forget the Golden Data Rule

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David Cummings

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Recently I was talking to an entrepreneur and we were discussing the importance of data control in business applications. Now, this is control in the sense of which application dictates who gets access to the data as opposed to which company owns the data (the customer always owns the data). During the conversation it occurred to me that there’s the Golden Data Rule just like there are the two common Golden Rules.

Golden Rule A: do to others what you would have them do to you.

Golden Rule B: he who owns the gold, makes the rules.

Golden Data Rule: he who controls the data, makes the rules.

This comes into play when considering business ideas and strategies that involve other application data (whether accessed through a plug-in, an API, or some other means). Big risks here include being a sharecropper on someone else’s land (they can take away access), “borrowing” the most successful features from your product and incorporating them into their product, or charging increasingly higher fees to access the data (taxes to access SaaS systems are more common than people realize).

At the end of the day, never forget the Golden Data Rule when building your company.

What else? What are your thoughts on the Golden Data Rule?

Comments

3 responses to “Never Forget the Golden Data Rule”

  1. Hilary Avatar
    Hilary

    Hi David… interesting post! I just posted a similar topic but from the other end here: http://hilarycinis.wordpress.com/2013/10/23/is-your-mvp-hackable/
    I am really interested in reading the responses from your readers about your topic.

    At the moment the only example I’ve been directly in contact with approaches this by respecting the privacy rules around sharing identity data (via avatars) through a reciprocal sharing activity. The partner uses an api access our platform to provide a visualisation, which also populates our platform’s public website for audiences to view. The partner’s audience members are kept anonymous when displayed in our website. This is a very simple example with normal third party sharing T&C’s.

    I think finding patterns in big data for commercial reasons is another kettle of scary fish, and I’m not sure governance is enough to handle the margin of abuse that can provide. International laws and standards for data? Really hard to fathom or answer.

    Reply
  2. entreprelution Avatar
    entreprelution

    I like the comparison of ‘golden data rule’ vs ‘golden rule – classic logic’. This suggests that he who possess the information truly commands the ship. I tend to agree, albeit, there’s definitely room to investigate statistically: Money vs Information….

    Ryan

    Reply
  3. Charles Hoyle Van Nuys Avatar
    Charles Hoyle Van Nuys

    Great food for thought. Thanks for posting.

    Reply

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