Comments on: There’s Not Yet Enough Backbone

By: Where are the Road Signs for the Structured Web? » AI3:::Adaptive Information

Tue, 29 May 2007 22:19:37 +0000

[...] As I discussed in an earlier posting, there's not yet enough backbone to the structured Web. I believe this structure should firstly be built around a lightweight subject- or topic-oriented reference layer. [...]

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 02 May 2007 19:10:01 +0000

Hi Sherman,

I’m glad you like the vertebrae analogy. In some subsequent pieces I’m working on I extend the analogy to also relate to how other specific domains — the many other body parts in the organism — also tie into (”hang off of”) this backbone structure. What I’m really thinking about is a simple, lightweight binding structure to which any and all third-party ontologies and structures can reference in relation to their subject coverage. This would greatly aid such things as guiding queries to SPARQL endpoints, collaborative P2P frameworks such as DBin, prompting vocabularies and structures for newly developed ontologies, etc.

I also totally concur with your views on context. But even in the case of an ambiguous term such as “driver”, an appropriate subject structure could have many placements related to golf, printers, automobilies. screws, NASCAR, whatever. In fact, such structure itself helps guide the context by virtue of which branches in the subject tree are of primary interest (i.e., enables disambiguation). (I’m also not ignoring relatedness, one reason why I like SKOS as reference schema.)

I’d be curious to know how we could direct the NLP tool you have written, Cypher, to Wikipedia, Cyc, and WordNet to make this happen. Interested?

Mike

By: Sherman Monroe

Sherman Monroe — Wed, 02 May 2007 17:37:11 +0000

I really like the use of a vertbrae analogy, because if you think about a backbone, each disc is seperately very ridge and provides alot of strength, but the loose links between the discs is what gives the backbone its flexibility. Likewise, the ultimate solution will need to provide a lot of (formal) structure and consistency, but be flexible enough to encompass all the different ways people will use and apply knowledge in the Semweb. Open collaboration of ontology development, e.g. a Wikitology, is one way to bring ontologies out of the silos and vacuums in which they are currently being created. Wikipedia is an example that such an approach can provide the consensus and the mass needed, both in bredth, and dept of this backbone. I also think one thing missing from your analysis is context. Take your Automobile example. In some contexts and for some users, for instance a user looking up an automobile’s history, a nameplate would be a “natural” property of a car, and the interface should mold around that and other properties. But for other contexts and users, for example a metal scrap yard owner looking up vehicles in his inventory, other “views” of car are more appropriate (weight for example). So the backbone (e.g. wikitology) will need to account for this kind of context, allowing and allow users to switch from one context to another as they transverse the data in this structured web.

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 02 May 2007 14:39:35 +0000

To All,

Shortly after posting this piece, I heard from Robert Cook at Metaweb correcting some initial errors in what the Metaweb Explorer does and its purpose to clean-up original Wikipedia structure. I have now made those corrections in the main body of the piece. Thanks, Robert! And I apologize for the initial errors.

But Robert also went on to observe other germane activities that Metaweb is undertaking in connection with Freebase. I quote Robert in full:

Freebase is attempting to fix exactly this problem [of lack of a governing subject structure]. The experts in a domain understand the structure much better than formal ontologists or data modelers. We’re trying to build tools for them to do so. We’re also creating the community mechanisms for users of the data to help give relevant feedback so that schemas can evolve in the right direction. It’s neither ‘top down’ nor ‘bottom up’ — it’s more like ‘middle out’ with a lot of communication. Right now, it’s very early and we haven’t proven this model, but we’re hopeful.

Thanks, Robert. I know all of us will be monitoring Freebase’s development with keen interest.

Mike