Is nothing > data?

A fairly interesting take on whether or not data should be singular (an issue that does not occur in French!):

In the Dark

I got this yesterday from one of my office mates who suggested that I stick it somewhere. It’s an advert for a data science company called Pivigo. Logically, the statement on the sticker implies that data is less than nothing, which I don’t think is the point that they’re trying to make. On the other hand, I suppose that by posting this I’ve given Pivigo some free advertising so in some sense it is a successful promotional ploy!

Anyway, when I posted this on Twitter it sparked a little discussion about the vexed issue of whether the word `data’ is singular or plural, so I decided to bore my readers with thoughts on that – not that I’m pedantic or anything.

The word `data’ is formed from the latin plural of the word `datum’ (itself formed from the past participle of the latin verb `dare’, meaning `to give’) hence meaning…

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