Self-Service Analytics Take Two

The Promise That Keeps Breaking Its Own HeartEvery few years, the data industry makes the same breathless promise - this time, everyone will be able to query their own data. This time, the business user won't need to file a ticket with the data team. This time, insights will flow freely, democratically, unleashed by the priesthood of SQL writers and dashboard architects. And every few years, that promise quietly collapses under its own weight. The wreckage is extensive. It stretches back decades-a graveyard of well-funded tools, ambitious rollouts, and executive keynotes that aged like milk. But now, something genuinely different is stirring. Large Language Models and Model Context Protocols are rewriting the rules of how humans interact with structured data. The question isn't whether this technology is impressive. I recently had a demo of what is possible and it is really revolutionary. The question is whether it can finally break the curse. To answer that, we have to first walk…