KMi Seminars
How to Combine Web2.0 and the Semantic Web
This event took place on Monday 23 April 2007 at 14:00

 
Tom Heath KMi, The Open University

It is not uncommon to view Web2.0 and the Semantic Web as mutually exclusive, competing paths to the Web of the future, each advocated by a distinct community. We argue that the two approaches are in fact complementary, and that both face challenges the other can solve, such as how to integrate Web2.0 data on a Web scale, and how to enable users to create semantically rich annotations. Here we will use examples from Revyu.com to demonstrate how features of Web2.0 and the Semantic Web can be combined in a single service that overcomes these challenges. Revyu is a Web site where people can review and rate anything they choose. The site is built on Semantic Web technologies, but also uses common features of Web2.0, such as keyword tagging.

 
KMi Seminars
 

Semantic Web and Knowledge Services is...


Semantic Web and Knowledge Services
"The Semantic Web is an extension of the current web in which information is given well-defined meaning, better enabling computers and people to work in cooperation" (Berners-Lee et al., 2001).

Our research in the Semantic Web area looks at the potentials of fusing together advances in a range of disciplines, and applying them in a systemic way to simplify the development of intelligent, knowledge-based web services and to facilitate human access and use of knowledge available on the web. For instance, we are exploring ways in which tnatural language interfaces can be used to facilitate access to data distributed over different repositories. We are also developing infrastructures to support rapid development and deployment of semantic web services, which can be used to create web applications on-the-fly. We are also investigating ways in which semantic technology can support learning on the web, through a combination of knowledge representation support, pedagogical theories and intelligent content aggregation mechanisms. Finally, we are also investigating the Semantic Web itself as a domain of analysis and performing large scale empirical studies to uncover data about the concrete epistemologies which can be found on the Semantic Web. This exciting new area of research gives us concrete insights on the different conceptualizations that are present on the Semantic Web by giving us the possibility to discover which are the most common viewpoints, which viewpoints are mutually inconsistent, to what extent different models agree or disagree, etc...

Our aim is to be at the forefront of both theoretical and practical developments on the Semantic Web not only by developing theories and models, but also by building concrete applications, for a variety of domains and user communities, including KMi and the Open University itself.