"If something cannot go on forever, it will stop." - Stein’s Law

I was talking with a client recently and we were discussing how certain pieces of their system that had once worked well, no longer seem to work well, if at all. I replied: "Everything works, until it doesn't."

The thing about technology, and especially data management technology, is that it is ever-evolving. And in almost all cases, we're not working with a single technology, but multiple systems, often integrated and/or somehow interrelated.

All of which is to say, there is ample opportunity for things to not work, or to stop working as changes in one piece of technology affect the other pieces. (Given how many opportunities there are for things to go wrong, it's perhaps amazing that things work as well as they do for as long as they do!)

But just like data management itself, the technology that we use to manage the data is a journey, not a destination. There is always new tech to replace old tech. (Ever heard of AI?) There are always increased demands from members and customers for better data, more accurate data, faster. And that will never change.

So remember: Everything works, until it doesn't.