Solution

Semi-structured data is a flexible format that combines some organizational aspects of structured data with the freedom of unstructured data, as seen with social media data. Posts and images are unstructured components, while metadata (e.g., timestamps, user information) adds a layer of structure that enables easier categorization and searching. This combination allows platforms to organize data without rigid formatting while still extracting valuable insights through metadata, making it ideal for handling the complex nature of social media data. Semi-structured data formats such as JSON or XML accommodate this variety by storing and describing diverse data types within a single dataset. The other options are incorrect because: • Structured Data (Option 1) is fully organized into tables, which lacks the flexibility needed for unstructured elements like text or images. • Unstructured Data (Option 2) includes content with no specific organization (e.g., plain text), but lacks metadata to classify and organize it. • Quantitative Data (Option 4) is strictly numerical and not applicable to social media data, which is qualitative and often descriptive. • Metadata (Option 5) is descriptive data about data but does not describe the overall structure or format of the dataset.