Nothing has changed with the data itself when it comes to problems.

What has changed is the frequency of those problems and the desperate hacks people try to hammer together either themselves or buy implementing other peoples hacks in the form of 3rd party software, shrink wrapped or not.

The frequency has increased simply because data is more prevalent than it ever was simply due to the growth of the use of computers and the notions people have about what data is important.

The hacks have increased because of the waves of people that never used data before that have entered the field because it's both a prevalent field and a lucrative field.  Ironically, it's like a bad drug habit.  The more people do it, the more they need to do it because a lot of the people that have problems importing, analyzing, using, and storing the data are also the same ones generating the data for others.

If you don't think so, just look at the questions/problems posed on these and other forums, database related or not.