"Ultimately I think we will find our jobs as data professionals becoming more and more complex as we must not only solve problems and manage data, but we will also end up being constrained by the legalities governing the data. "

I could not agree more with what you have said Steve. As we in IT have invaded the business world automating as we go we have done some very complex processing. Now as we reach further into the workplace and the realm of science we are doing the much more complex for the simple low hanging stuff is done.

And since we have been working closer and closer to the heart of the business we are finding that business and process owners are growing more and more apprehensive. With this apprehension comes concern,k and with concern, protection, and with protect comes legal. It will get much more complex as it moves forward. In the old days it was if we were doing magic and no one really understood what we were doing. Auditors all but gave up in some cases for it was all but impossible to understand what we were doing.

Now they understand the how of what we have done and are doing and are making further more complex requirements of our software, processes, and products to insure that the how we are doing things is the most correct way. (Really this is as it should be, but as a result it becomes more complex).