[okfn-discuss] ANN: Uberblic.org - Integrating the Web of Data

[Mr. Puneet Kishor]

On Jan 29, 2010, at 11:07 AM, Jo Walsh wrote:

> dear all,
>
> On 29/01/2010 16:18, Mr. Puneet Kishor wrote:
>>> There is so much open and often linked data available on the web,  
>>> but
>>> there has been a lack of an integration service tying together all  
>>> that linked
>>> data into a more coherent experience.
>
>> This is great, but how is it different from http://ckan.net?
>>
>> Having a service like this is extremely necessary, but having too  
>> many
>> services like this, especially ones that overlap, might lead to
>> confusion. Clarity of purpose vis a vis existing efforts might be  
>> very
>> helpful.
>
> Well, that's how the semweb, or Web of Data, or Linked Data Web, is  
> likely to look in the short term. Lots and lots of aggregation  
> services collecting different subsets of the universe of triples. Re- 
> aggregating other sites, moving eyeballs around.
>
> You can see a reflection of this in social network cross-posting and  
> aggregation services, for example FriendFeed. This was bought by  
> Facebook, I imagine because it was potentially or actually diverting  
> traffic away from FB.
>
> An online service like FriendFeed collects your communication  
> streams from different sites together. A client like Posterous or  
> even Tweetdeck lets you send messages through to multiple sites. It  
> matters less and less where the information is made, where it is  
> stored, as long as it can be discovered.
>
> Yes this leads to a lot of redundancy. We have got used to the  
> centralised, one-ring-to-rule model for types of online services,  
> redundancy can be confusing - one never knows exactly where to look,  
> and everything is slightly deja vu.
>
> Years ago I worked on a prototype online service for a kind of self- 
> organising, distributed art festival in London. It pulled in RSS  
> listings from different event sites, correlated that with spatial  
> RDF from the OpenGuides wiki, FOAF maps of participants...
>
> The event curators loved the *idea*. When they were presented with  
> the actual prototype, the main response "there are seven versions of  
> this event here. Which is the real one?"
>
> Puneet, I think we just have to get used to overlap.

To use an over-used metaphor, I guess it will be Darwinian. I'd rather  
have many services than none, but eventually, the stronger one or two  
might survive. I am not pitching for CKAN over the other, and I am  
certainly not sure if CKAN will be around 15 years from now. I hope  
so, but no one can see the future.

 From the point of the "user," I want to have one magic box in which I  
enter my query, and then have that query be answered from wherever. Is  
that magic box called "Google"? Is it my command line on my Terminal?  
Is it a set of APIs that allow me to get to search and get to the data  
programmatically?

 From the point of the "contributor," I want to enter my data in one  
place and have it be visible to all.

I am a big fan of CPAN (for those who might not be aware of it -- the  
Comprehensive Perl Archive Network). It is a network of mirrors with  
considerable redundancy so that no one node is canonical or critical.  
CPAN is usually the model for all other C[A-Z]ANs, in the concept at  
least, but not in architecture. It would take a considerable amount of  
traction, history and commitment to have CKAN become like CPAN, but it  
may be a worthwhile goal.

-- 
Puneet Kishor http://www.punkish.org
Carbon Model http://carbonmodel.org
Charter Member, Open Source Geospatial Foundation http://www.osgeo.org
Science Commons Fellow, http://sciencecommons.org/about/whoweare/kishor
Nelson Institute, UW-Madison http://www.nelson.wisc.edu
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