Data creation is exploding with the increasingly high amounts of content being created on a daily basis, such as stories, selfies, and videos, that people refuse to delete on the cloud. Digitalization spreads its wings rapidly and takes over businesses and our every- day lives. 92% of the currently generated data has been created during the last two years.
Education is shaping up into an online-oriented environment, businesses are extending all over the Internet, while even the most common consumer becomes a decision-maker in modern-day society as a content creator or average user.
Everything requires storage space. Your images, your favorite audiobooks, even your social media content. You may not see it through your personal device, but even your profile picture is stored somewhere on the Internet.
Data storage has undergone a quite impressive evolution: from the conventional storage space (SSD and HDD) to cloud storage solutions, promising to be the future of computer science.
It appears that the Transformation of businesses is not the keen reason for the rise of data creation. The giants in this statistic are social media, video sharing, and communications. Have you ever wondered how much space is needed every day?
Here’s a brief look on paper:
– In 2020, people created 1.7 MB of data every second.
– In 2020, users sent around 500,000 Tweets per day.
– In 2021, 68% of Instagram users viewed photos from brands to this point.
– Every day, 306.4 billion emails are sent, and 500 million Tweets are made.
– By the end of 2021, 45 zettabytes will make up the entire digital universe.
– By 2022, 70% of the globe’s GDP will have undergone digitization.
– By 2025, 200+ zettabytes of data will be in cloud storage around the globe.
But if we’re talking about how much data is created every day the current estimate stands at 1.145 trillion MB per day. A trillion has 12 zeros, just FYI.
After 2020, there is 5200 gigabytes of data for every person in the world, summing up to 40 zettabytes. With more people getting exposed to the Internet, the statistics of Internet user growth and activity are scary, especially at its current rate:
A Statista Research Study shows us an explicit growth and expectation in Data consumption and creation for the range of 2010 to 2025.
Figure 3. The volume of data created and consumed worldwide from 2010 to 2025, Statista, 2021.
Source: Statista
– There were 4.66 billion active internet users around the world in January 2021, which is almost 60% of the World’s population.
– Facebook generated four petabytes of data every day in 2020, most of it is video.
– Twitter has generated 3 billion tweets for 2021 thus far.
Some may be curious about the importance of these statistics. But let us put it simply: it takes approximately 1MB to send one Snapchat. Imagine how much storage space the online video platforms need to satisfy the needs of so many active users daily!
According to popular scientific research, YouTube, Twitch, and Snapchat are the most popular video-sharing social media platforms.
A poor-quality YouTube video takes not less than 500MB per hour. The increase in content creation for the last 1 year for YouTube is estimated at 70% growth. This means that by the end of 2020, the amount of data on YouTube will be doubled with this current rate of production.
It is no secret that the amount of IoT devices is experiencing tremendous growth, and with it, the number of active users and subscriptions rise up to unthinkable levels. China alone has approximately 4 billion devices for 2021 and counting up.
We think you get the picture…
Based on the tendencies, the numbers are sure to increase. And there is no problem with progress and the Internet becoming even more overwhelming. It is the pace that scares even the biggest technology visionaries of our time. Simple example- Google alone has registered more than 6 billion searches a day for 2020, which means that the result for 2021 would be higher than 2 trillion.
The truth is that people are holding on to the social aspect of digitalization and using it as the tool for the creation of the new Digital Renaissance. But what are the means to withstand such rapid growth statistics of data creation?
Researchers and scientists are alarming that such rates of content creation are growing faster with each year, spreading the fear that the world storage capacities might not endure such a challenging size of data creation.
According to the IDC Data Age, the Data created in the world by 2025 would be indeed impossible to store.
Fig. 1 IDC Data Age Predictions for Data creation by 2025
Source: IDC & Seagate, 2017
Today, the total amount of data in existence is doubling every other year. Such growth is not sustainable, but with data having proven indispensable, simply creating less of it is not an option. In order to avert this crisis, what is needed is storage media that offers storage density that is vastly superior to what is currently available.
One of the most detailed and sophisticated reports and statistics is presented by Data Reportal. According to them, the number of users was growing by 1 million every day during 2019, counting 3,5 billion users at that moment.
Data Scientists and Big Data analysts bring several conclusions to mind:
– Cloud storage is the future
– Complete industry alternation
– Social awareness
Yes, these 3. There are also others, that are as if coming more from the world of the sci-fi Legendarium, such as DNA compositions for storage. While the last 2 require a lot of changes and personal responsibility, the concept of the cloud is not going anywhere for sure. On the contrary, with hardware innovations and sustainability improvements made, the Cloud solutions might be the only possible or achievable decision in such short terms, if 2025 is to be considered.
The most influential modern-day artists are the tech leaders of our new era. Their visions for technology in the future shape the new “standard” for information and how we use it. Soon, augmented and virtual realities will be considered something normal, used on a daily basis. This will require a new solution for the alarming forecast for the storage deficit. Cloud technology is undoubtedly perceived as the NEEDED cradle of Innovations and the main opposer of the projected shortage of digital space.
We at pCloud believe that you deserve to have the freedom to organize your digital life in the most secure way possible, while being able to share and access your data anywhere you go, anytime, from any device. Effortlessly.
Many have already assured the safety of their most valuable asset nowadays- their information, and committed to the cloud as their trusted data storage tool. If the tendencies and statistics are to be taken with the necessary depth, those who use the cloud might be the first to survive the impending “Datageddon”.
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