these keepsake passwords, as I came to call them, are like tchotchkes of our inner lives.”13 Big data might find it hard to find meaning, or relevance, in insights like these. In every study I mention there is a missing question: How might these findings be combined with small data to affect or transform a brand or business? Subtext Research might reveal that a 16-year-old girl who listens to “intense” music might find it a poor fit with her teenaged identity, and a 45-year-old Englishman who listens to John Coltrane and Chopin
