The Kafkian Castle and the Digital Universe

40,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 Bytes (40 Zettabytes), that’s how much digitally stored data humankind will possess by 2020, according to IDC, That is nearly 40% increase per year

Intersect360 Research projects the HPC revenue compound annual growth rate to be 6.5% from 2012 to 2017, reaching $39.9 billion at the end of the forecast period.

Here we are: Digital Universe increases 40%, while the size of the technology required to make sense of these enormous data increases only 6.5%,

I discovered that 99%  of the world scientists are supercomputer illiterate and they don't have access to one large cluster or supercomputer.

 Most supercomputers have restricted access, have individual allocations. They are shielded by armies of computer scientists.  The researchers must go through them. It is not like working with a Mac.

They are like inside the village with the Castle - from Franz  Kafka novel - in the background. Every one can see it, but no one knows how to get there

The Top500 Tianhe-2 supercomputer is such a castle. No one knows how much it costs, no one is sure what software they use and what applications they run. But it is the fastest. Fastest for what?