http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/sep06/4448
Michael Stonebraker
"As the data streaming in from computers, sensors, and other devices swells, new infrastructure will be needed to manage the flood. There is a sea change coming from the plummeting cost of microsensor technology. This change will cause everything of material significance on the planet to be sensor-tagged to report its state or location in real time, which will create a whole new collection of applications to process and monitor streaming data. You have also heard about the possibility of a tsunami early-warning system, but in the U.S., it might be more important to have an alarm system for severe weather, especially wind gusts and tornados. Such a system is readily buildable by adding real-time processing to the current collection of weather sensors on the ground throughout the nation. Lastly, there is considerable interest in performing real-time monitoring of computer networks." [3 pages]
