You might think there’s no value in reading about what not to build. But the proliferation of data and analytical platform tools, the fact that the Modern Data Stack (MDS) is losing traction, and the many articles about ‘building a data platform’ have led me to issue this warning.

It is a warning to IT professionals who work for larger corporations. As every consultant tends to answer all questions, ‘it depends’ on your specific situation whether this warning is relevant. So decide four yourself based on the background information I’m about to provide here.

The Data Platform

Perhaps because Zhamak Dehghani called it “data infrastructure as a platform”, or because the cloud providers sell us “Data Platform as a Service (DPaaS — not to be confused with Data Protection as a Service)”, or because building a platform is simply in vogue, we are caught up in this idea.

But what is a data platform actually?

Let’s take the cloud computing model of a platform to better understand the value proposition. It provides developers with a platform to build, deploy, and manage applications without dealing with the underlying infrastructure. PaaS…