Archive for the 'Semantic Web' Category

DataPortability, Microsoft’s Contacts API and OpenSocial.org

Published
by
Cloud
on 26/3/2008
in Data Portability, FOAF, SIOC, Semantic Web, Social Networks, Social Software and Web 2.0
. 5 Comments Tags: , , , .

20080326a.png (No, the picture I created on the right ISN’T the new DataPortability logo; I totally missed out on the closing date, but it will serve as an image for this blog post. There have been some very cool submissions for the competition however.)

There were two interesting announcements yesterday in the portability space. The first was from Microsoft, announcing that they would be “working with Facebook, Bebo, Hi5, Tagged and LinkedIn to exchange functionally-similar Contacts APIs, allowing us to create a safe, secure two-way street for users to move their relationships between our respective services” (Contacts APIs provide contact data portability). The second was from Google, Yahoo! and MySpace, jointly announcing that an OpenSocial Foundation is to be formed as a non-profit entity (OpenSocial provides social application portability). Unfortunately, there is still some confusion regarding exactly what data portability functionality OpenSocial will offer (if any), and at the moment the consensus seems to be that DataPortability and OpenSocial aren’t as related as previously thought.

DataPortability (including Microsoft’s move in this area) is mainly about users being able to have portable data (profiles, identities, content like photos, videos, discussion posts) that they can move between the services and sites that they trust and choose to use. (See Uno de Waal’s interesting post on how the Microsoft Invite2Messenger service allows you to get your Facebook friends’ e-mail addresses in plain text.)

OpenSocial on the other hand is more about “gadget” portability, where social applications can be deployed across a variety of social networking sites. As summarised by Julian Bond, OpenSocial consists of a gadget API (for gadget programmers) and a standard for site owners to implement these gadgets on their own sites. The part of OpenSocial related to DataPortability is a REST API, details of which are a bit vague right now. Not to be confused with OpenSocial (although the similar names make this difficult), the Social Graph API from Google is more related to DataPortability as it indexes semantic data from many social networking sites like Hi5, MySpace, LiveJournal, Twitter, etc. and allows users to bring their social graph with them when they sign up for a new site that supports the API.

Apart from the lack of intersection between Microsoft (plus affiliate Facebook) and Google, a good few companies are in multiple “camps” (DataPortability, Contacts APIs, OpenSocial), as shown by the Venn diagram I drew below:

20080326b.png

Marc Canter and others have pointed out that although the Contact APIs from Microsoft are not open in themselves, at least the APIs seem to export as much data as they can import. Marc also says that Microsoft (and other big companies) may not be explicitly following the actions (e.g. the technical recommendations) of the DataPortability initiative, but rather claims that it would hurt them if they didn’t open up and go along with some portable data efforts given the current climate and the tide of users in favour of this.

For users to have true data portability, there needs to be some consensus on both the APIs and the formats needed to transfer / represent this portable data. It may be that a number of APIs and formats are required for different scenarios. The Semantic Web is an ideal means for representing the data to be ported from social websites, in that is well suited (using vocabularies like SIOC and FOAF) to represent how people and all kinds of objects on these sites are connected together (documents, discussions, meetups, places, interests, media files - whatever). Of course other data formats may be used, but most importantly, it would be a waste of time to come up with a bunch of new formats for representing the data that needs to be portable, because a lot of work has been done on how to best provide interoperable, reusable and linked data through efforts like the Semantic Web, AtomPub and the microformats community.

I’ll be attending the DataPortability Lunch Meetup in London on the 6th April 2008 if anyone there feels like a chat about some of these topics…

Related posts:

Nova Spivack visits DERI, NUI Galway and talks about Twine: Radar Networks’ semantic social software product in beta

Published
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Cloud
on 25/3/2008
in BlogTalk, DERI, FOAF, Galway, NUI Galway, SIOC, Semantic Web, Social Networks, Social Software, US and Web 2.0
. 0 Comments

20080325b.png In association with the IT Association of Galway, DERI recently invited Radar Networks‘ Nova Spivack to speak at our research institute in the National University of Ireland, Galway (Nova also gave a keynote talk at BlogTalk 2008 in Cork).

Nova is CEO of one of the companies that is practically applying Semantic Web technologies to social software applications. Radar have a beta product called Twine which is a “knowledge networking” application that allows users to share, organise, and find information with people they trust. People create and join “twines” (community containers) around certain topics of interest, and items (documents, bookmarks, media files, etc., that can be commented on) are posted to these twines through a variety of methods. The seminar room was full of both “DERIzens” and members of Galway’s IT community for Nova’s talk on the Semantic Web and Twine (see his slides here), and after a lengthy question-and-answers session, this was followed by some presentations to Nova of ongoing research work in DERI.

20080325c.png I personally find Twine very interesting, and as well as using it to gather information about SIOC, I intend to use it to gather and publish personal interests that I think will be of interest to the public (once it leaves beta). As well as producing semantic data (just stick “?rdf” onto the end of any twine.com URL), Twine features some cool functionality that elevates it beyond the social bookmarking sites to which it has been compared, including an extensive choice of twineable item types, twined item customisation (”add detail”) and the “e-mail to a twine” feature, all of which I believe are extremely useful. (I have a few Twine invites left for readers of my blog; drop me an e-mail if you need one.)

There is also the community aspects of twines. I forsee that these twines will act as the “social objects” (see presentation by Jyri) that will draw you back to the service, in a much stronger manner than other social bookmarking sites currently do (due to Twine’s more viral nature, its stronger social networking functionality, better commenting, and a more identifiable “home” for these objects). Of course, having more public users will help, but from experience I know that it is a good idea to build on a core group of regular users (in Twine’s case, mainly techies) before increasing the user base too much.

It’s been an exciting few months in terms of announcements relating to commercial Semantic Web applications. As I mentioned recently in an interview with Rob Cawte for the web2.0japan.com blog, this is becoming obvious with the attention being given to startup companies in this space like Powerset, Metaweb (Freebase) and Radar Networks (Twine), and also since many big companies including Reuters (Calais API), Yahoo! (semantically-enhanced search) and Google (Social Graph API) have recently announced what they are doing with semantic data. There has been a lot of talk recently about the social graph (notably from Google’s Brad Fitzpatrick), which looks at how people are connected together (friends, colleagues, neighbours, etc.), and how such connections can be leveraged across websites. On the Semantic Web with vocabularies like FOAF, SIOC, etc., it is not just people who are connected together in some meaningful way, but documents, events, places, hobbies, pictures, you name it! And it is the commercial applications that exploit these connections that are now becoming interesting…

(Edit: Nova Spivack has blogged about his visit.)

“The semantic web enables us to use portals in a more intelligent fashion, so we can do business more efficiently”

Published
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Cloud
on 25/3/2008
in General, Semantic Web and Web 2.0
. 1 Comment

The Irish Times: Innovation

The Return of the Portal

Haydn Shaughnessy

March 10, 2008

In a perfect world, the internet would have evolved in a planned and orderly way, and that means, quite illogically, that Web 2.0 would not have followed Web 1.0.

The plan hatched by experts at the World Wide Web Consortium, the body that supervises web standards, was for the second generation to be something a little different to Bebo and Facebook, called the Semantic Web.

“It means adding more meaning to the web,” says web expert John Breslin of NUI Galway, “so that people and computers can work together more easily, so that computers in fact can do more of the work.”

Put simply, Web 2.0 was supposed to be the time when search engines worked perfectly. And the semantic web is the technology that allows you more of a push-button approach to information issues, so you are not overloaded, but enabled.

Today marks the launch of the first such project for the buying public - the New York launch of MutualArt.com, a global initiative to link art collectors (the buyers) with artists, museums, galleries and information sources including the leading art publications, auction house information and prices. It is the first major application of the semantic web to a consumer service.

Continue reading ‘“The semantic web enables us to use portals in a more intelligent fashion, so we can do business more efficiently”’

Trip planning via the Semantic Web

Published
by
Cloud
on 25/3/2008
in DERI, Semantic Web, TripPlanr and Web 2.0
. 5 Comments

I am delighted to announced that DERI, NUI Galway and Tourist Republic Ltd. have been successful in receiving funding from Enterprise Ireland (under the Innovation Partnership programme) to work on the TripPlanr project: a semantically-enabled collaborative trip-planning application for individuals and groups.

Before the advent of the Web, a traveller’s options were limited by the scarcity of information he or she could find about a destination. Planning a trip involved visiting travel agencies, making phone calls and asking friends or friends-of-a-friend for their experiences. These days, the Web allows the traveller to purchase travel tickets, accommodation and other travel products with the minimum of human intervention. However, the lack of expert guidance has made processing and assessing various travel products extremely difficult. The traveller is presented with a surfeit of similarly sounding destination descriptions and offers. In short, a problem of information deficit has been replaced with the problem of information overload.

Last year, Jan Blanchard, the CEO of Tourist Republic, approached myself and Conor Hayes in DERI with the idea of extending their existing TouristR destination review site to help the traveller plan a more complex travel product, such as a trip with multiple destinations on a fixed budget and timeline. In this situation, there is no online assistance to help the traveller cope with the additional problem of selecting and combining multiple elements so that budgetary, geographical, temporal and other personal constraints and preferences are observed.

TripPlanr, an integrated trip-planning advisor, is the result: a joint project between Tourist Republic and DERI that will tackle the information overload and planning problems by filtering and making recommendations based on the preferences of the traveller and their social network. The TripPlanr application builds on the existing TouristR platform and DERI’s specialised expertise in recommender systems, information mining, the Semantic Web and Web 2.0.

Today, online travel booking is used mainly for trips with few parts, like airline tickets. Unlike existing trip planning applications, it is envisioned that the new TripPlanr application will allow users to book more complex and personalised trips with a number of parts. By collecting relevant data and suggesting it to the right user at the right time, TripPlanr increases the probability for that user to book or purchase the product or service in question.

Last month, there was an interesting interview by Marie Boran in the Irish Independent with the creator of the Web, Tim Berners-Lee, in which he outlined a typical travel scenario that can be aided by Semantic Web technologies:

Your flight is to JFK airport, your business meetings are in New Jersey but you want to go sightseeing in New York and your hotel must be near a diabetic-friendly restaurant. Planning a business trip can be stressful at the best of times but doing it all through the web can be an eye-opening experience, says Tim Berners-Lee, as he explains how his invention, the world wide web, has its limitations and why he has spent the past decade working on its upgrade: the semantic web. “To make a detailed travel decision or similar, you need to see all that information on the same map. Currently, you have to print out all the data, sort through it and then stand back and see if you can make the connections yourself. “With a semantic website you could pull all these information forms together instantly and put them on the same map.”

WebCamp SNP and BlogTalk 2008 approacheth…

Published
by
Cloud
on 1/3/2008
in BlogTalk, Blogs, Cork, DERI, Data Portability, FOAF, Internet, Ireland, SIOC, Semantic Web, Social Media, Social Networks, Social Software, Web, Web 2.0, WebCamp and Wikis
. 2 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

I’m in Cork with a posse of eight from DERI, and it’s the night before two co-located events: the WebCamp workshop on social network portability (Sunday) and the BlogTalk conference on social software (Monday, Tuesday). Others that have arrived in Cork this evening include Niall Larkin, Ajit Jaokar, Aral Balkan, Ben Ward, Dan Brickley, Ross Duggan and Stephanie Booth.

I’m really looking forward to the talks, the discussions, the networking, the food, and some positive outcomes from the next three days. And with invited speakers of this quality, I know it’s going to be good.

Unfortunately, I’m missing the Irish Blog Awards for the second year running, but boards.ie’s Managing Director Gerry Shanahan is representing us as a sponsor. At least I hope to meet up with many of the bloggers at tomorrow night’s optional blogger’s dinner at Rossini’s here in Cork (43 people have signed up).

More blog posts about the events will be available via the tags webcampsnp and blogtalk2008. Here are some recent posts:

Five days left to register online for BlogTalk 2008!

Published
by
Cloud
on 22/2/2008
in BlogTalk, Blogs, Cork, Data Portability, FOAF, Internet, SIOC, Semantic Web, Social Media, Social Networks, Social Software, Web, Web 2.0, WebCamp and Wikis
. 0 Comments

Please note that online registration for BlogTalk 2008 (and WebCamp Social Network Portability) will close next Wednesday, 26th February 2008.

You can register at Amiando.

There are a few discount codes out there.

(Don’t forget to sign up for the optional blogger’s dinner as well!)

DataPortability and me, JB

Published
by
Cloud
on 20/2/2008
in Data Portability, FOAF, SIOC, Semantic Web and Social Software
. 3 Comments Tags: , , , , .

As part of the DataPortability initiative, I’ve put together this video explaining why I think it’s important and how it fits in with the Semantic Web and SIOC:

(Edit: An audio recording of this morning’s steering group telecon is now available.)

Semantic Web for Dummies

Published
by
Cloud
on 20/2/2008
in Data Portability, FOAF, SIOC and Semantic Web
. 4 Comments Tags: , , , , .

20080220a.jpg I referenced this on the SIOC-Dev mailing list recently, and when I pasted it on the DataPortability.org steering group chat this morning (in parallel with our first phone conference), Drummond Reed suggested I blog it. It’s originally from MIT’s Stefan Marti:

XML customised tags, like:
<dog>Nena</dog>
+ RDF relations, in triples, like:
(Nena) (is_dog_of) (Kimiko/Stefan)
+ Ontologies / hierarchies of concepts, like:
mammal -> canine -> Cotton de Tulear -> Nena
+ Inference rules like:
If (person) (owns) (dog), then (person) (cares_for) (dog)
= Semantic Web!

(Picture by Duncan Hull.)

“A funny thing happened on the way to the forum”: Article in Indo about 10 years of boards.ie

Published
by
Cloud
on 15/2/2008
in BlogTalk, Blogs, Boards, Cork, DERI, Games, Internet, Ireland, NUI Galway, SIOC, Semantic Web, Social Media, Social Networks, Social Software and Web
. 1 Comment

20080214a.png Irish Independent > Business > Technology > A funny thing happened on the way to the forum
After 10 years, John Breslin’s online forum on everything from personal relationships to motors and mustard, boards.ie, is still blazing a trail

By Marie Boran
Thursday February 14 2008

Want to know where you can buy the cheapest digital camera, or how to go about claiming rent relief, or maybe if buying cowboy boots would be a fashion disaster?

The world relies on Google but the Irish have boards.ie. On this online bulletin board no question is too trivial or too bizarre and with an average 900,000 visitors to the site every month, there are plenty of answers on offer.

It is hard to believe that a decade ago, on 12 February, 1998, boards.ie founder John Breslin wrote expectantly: “The first of many messages, I hope.”

Read more…

Of course, there are four other people who have made boards.ie possible: Tom Murphy, Dan King, Gerry Shanahan, and Jerry Connolly. Without them and our amazing team of voluntary moderators, I doubt boards.ie would even exist today. Original questions and answers follow.

Continue reading ‘“A funny thing happened on the way to the forum”: Article in Indo about 10 years of boards.ie’

The Google Social Graph API: the good and the bad

Published
by
Cloud
on 4/2/2008
in Data Portability, FOAF, SIOC, Semantic Web, Social Media, Social Networks, Social Software and Web 2.0
. 1 Comment Tags: , , , .

I was very interested to hear about the launch of Google’s social graph API at the weekend. The social graph API “returns web addresses of public pages and publicly-declared connections between them”, where the connections are currently being obtained from crawled XFN and FOAF links. Dan Brickley, the co-creator of FOAF said:

The Google API looks like a step in a very interesting direction. Of course it will be possible to think of many things it doesn’t yet do, but I encourage everyone here to have a think about simple, practical and useful incremental improvements to it. We can do a lot more eg. with full SPARQL access, but proving full SPARQL to the aggregation of the planet’s public FOAF/XFN data isn’t going to happen anytime soon. Interesting times :)

In answer to Niall Larkin’s question about how this relates to SIOC, such services help us because by providing an easy method to find one’s social graph (both “me” and “knows” connections), it also makes it easier to find your social objects which can be described using SIOC (see my previous illustration, and see also Kingsley Idehen’s demonstration of how this can work).

In short, you can use FOAF to create the social graph, and use SIOC to represent social objects.

Not everybody is entirely happy (see the comments on Tim O’Reilly’s blog post), with the majority of objections being in relation to the APIs being operated by a for-profit as opposed to a non-profit organisation, and there is some opposition to the idea of a single point of control rather than having a set of distributed indexes.

Perhaps we need something similar to “nofollow” links for the public social graph as well. We will discuss these issues and some other important social network portability topics at WebCamp SNP in four weeks time.

Edit: What I can add to this is my gut feeling that it probably requires a company like Google to make an API that can gather the required momentum and that people will use; previous FOAF aggregator efforts like Plink and FOAFSpace could have done this, but they would have found it much harder to gain critical mass.