As if geek lexicon wasn't convoluted enough already, research about the amount of data we're consuming has forced the use of a new term: the zettabyte.
Tech research and consultancy firm IDC has been looking into the amount of information the human race is outputting digitally, showing that we've outputted 8 million petabytes of information onto the web so far - the equivalent of 8,000,000,000,000 GB.
And given the rate at which we're sharing video, tweeting, uploading photos etc, that number will soon cross into unheard of territory: 1.2 zettabytes of information, or 12,000,000 PB.
It's all about the facts
Adrian MacDonald, VP of EMC that sponsored the survey, said: "There has been mammoth growth in the types of media that make up the digital universe.
"A huge increase in video and digital photography – in the old days people would take one photograph, now they can knock off 20 photos and rather than store just one, people store all 20.
"Then there is the fact that the number of devices where information can be generated and stored has also increased."
We're (or a certain member of our team is) putting forward our claims for the next unit of measurement: the gazzabyte. Has a certain ring to it - better than a yottabyte anyway...
Via the Telegraph
