Thursday, January 31, 2008

Socially Networked NewsRooms

2 comments :
Here is an interesting experiment to create an Election News Network . Publish2 is a free online editorial platform for journalists, editors, and newsrooms. Scott Karp is the co-founder, President & CEO and he is also main author of Publishing 2.0 a blog that i am a fan of. I love Karp's attitude on whether the Elections News Network will work:
"Will it work? I dunno. It’s an experiment. We’re in beta. I could have called a committee meeting to commission a study into whether it will work. Instead we decided to JUST DO IT."

Over the years i have work with many media clients, many who unfortunately have had to do major cuts within their libraries and research centers that journalists relied on heavily for research on articles they were writing- many of these researchers served as 'networkers' potentially hooking up journalists that were working on similar stories. Over the last few years i have always brought up the idea that journalists would benefit for tools like social bookmarking, wiki like publishing, social networking (between journalists in big organizations for example) etc.

Publish2 seems to be a platform that enables this. From their site (i have not tried the service):

Publish2’s mission is to bring all of the world’s journalists onto one common web platform and community, one that empowers journalists to discover, organize, and rank the most important news — to benefit your own reporting, your newsroom, and all news consumers on the web. Publish2 is optimized for you as a journalist, combining online bookmarking, news aggregation, and social networking.

This post by Jack Lail 'Read What we Found' explains how Knoxnews.com plans on implementing it going beyond just their own journalists by picking top community bloggers to also make selections- i see this type of implementation like a controlled de.li.cious tag that only certain people are allowed to use on a domain and the more journalists bookmark a story, the higher it rises in the ranking on the site that publishes the 'widget'. Not sure if they can also leave comments on the bookmark but that would also be useful.

Will have to check back during and after the elections to see how this experiment goes.

Image attribution: cheesebikini.

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

So I Get to Be a Potty Mouth at Work

2 comments :
i got to be a potty mouth at work again this week, well at least i got to read and speak a lot of 'bad' words because i have been having various conversations with prospects and one with a partner about 'Inappropriate Language' taxonomies (uh but lot's of words are in my own daily vocabulary so does that make me inappropriate?- WT#@!?;-) .

So as you can imagine i am already loving my new focus as Business Development Manager for Synaptica which includes among other things the Taxonomy Warehouse site (yes site needs some work) that has such fascinating topics as 700,000 Acronyms, Initialisms and Abbreviations, Fashion and Apparel and of course my personal favorite Inappropriate Language that are partners provide.

So over the last few years custom taxonomies and pre-built taxonomies have been a major part of the work that my teams have delivered to customers. With my background in information science and years of experience in observing our taxonomy experts custom build taxonomies i know the hundreds of 'people hours' that it takes to build a solid taxonomy/thesaurus. However, it is a hard conversation to have with a lot of customers when license costs are discussed- because if you haven't built one you simply can't imagine the effort in not only building but implementing and governing to ensure that it remains fresh.

So, i have been stressing out a bit because of a meeting a signed myself up for and i don't think it was for a valid reason at all-just because i license taxonomies and thesauri for a fee it doesn't mean i don't support open standards like those that are supported by the DataPortability group - the DP group is not about 'free' it is about open standards that allow portability of data regardless if it is 'paid' for or not. So for example, many of our available taxonomies are delivered to customers via RDF format one of the DP supported formats.

So i was stressing specifically because I signed up for the Freebase meetup next week ( Freebase is a collaboratively-edited database of cross-linked data) and had to answer the following question as part of a survey:

Do you fit into any of these groups?
  • I'm an open data person. Information wants to be free!
  • >>So i am an open data person- but i don't think that all information wants or can afford to be free.
  • I have this specific topic I'm really into, and want Freebase to hold the data about it.
  • >>>ok sure i can come up with something and when i submitted the survey i had no use that i could devote time to but now I thinking of potentially looking at freebase to manage the DP Definitions.
  • I develop apps or mashups, and want to use Freebase data
  • >>>my dream, to have time and real skills to do this well
  • I refuse to be labeled, but will describe myself here:
So i submitted that i refuse to be labeled because...my answer "it's a long story". So i am looking forward to dropping by and meeting some of the Freebasers (i attended a Freebase session at BarCamp but didn't really participate and honestly since it has been on my radar but i have not delved as deep as i wanted to).

Anyway....if you are interested in licensing an inappropriate language taxonomy please contact me so i can continue to be a potty mouth and if you are lucky enough (i promise i won't charge you any more ;-) you can hear me articulate some of the terms that essentially are inappropriate for corporate communications- just because we can.

Image attributed to

The First Monthly DataPortability Project Report

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Dear Husband,

No i am not having an affair via Skype or posting my personal desires in public and private Google Groups, although i have spent in an inordinate amount of time over the last few weeks- more then usual doing this things but darlin' there is a purpose....

I among many others who are actively participating in the DataPortability Project have been very busy- and remember many of us like me have full time plus+ jobs- making sure that what we started does not just become another project without any action.

Remember when i cursed out loud the other night because of some naysayer? Well i am sure he is still talking crap since i haven't seen any action out of him- but i am beyond that because what is happening is a lot of really smart engaged people who care are contributing and we are getting things done- although i hate to tell you that there is a lot more to do and i am committed to doing my part.

So today the first monthly DataPortability Report was published, yeah i know you don't really care because it ain't your bag and you probably only care about the output of the project as it affects your own personal online use, but i am really proud that the team i am part of within the DataPortability Evangelism Action group has published this report. Not sure if this is good news for you specifically.... but we are going to be publishing these monthly so everyone sees the work that all the Action Groups are doing.

We hope these reports will serve as digests for those who want to follow the conversation but don't have the time to monitor the conversation closely. But don't worry, I can give you personal updates as needed so you don't have to bother to subscribe ;-)

Thanks for your understanding and i love you,

-daniela

Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Social Media Measurement Webinar this Thursday with Jeremiah Owyang

1 comment :
My friend and one of my favorite Silicon Valley rock stars Jeremiah Owyang a Senior Analyst at Forrester Research will be presenting a Webinar on the Topic of Social Media this Thursday (9:30PST/12:30EST) with Glenn Fannick, Product Development Manager for Factiva Insight at Dow Jones.

Jeremiah and I worked very closely in late 2006 to put together a social media roundtable event in Palo Alto, CA with influential early social media Evangelists including many social media enthusiasts, corporate practitioners and PR/Corporate Communication attendees. In the tradition of Social Media the event was well documented and the community continued to discuss the topics addressed after the roundtable. After the event Jeremiah also worked with us to co-author a white paper based on some of the findings and outstanding questions.

I have seen both Jeremiah and Glenn speak quite often and they are always dynamic speakers so they promise not to disappoint. I look forward to listening in this week to see how the conversation has matured over the last year and i have no doubt that I will learn quite a bit.

There are over 800 registered attendees already and if you are interested you can still registered.

Monday, January 28, 2008

Are we tired of Simple and Advanced Searching features?

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Are we getting bored with the little simple search box?

Today's buzz about Google's new search views reminded me to go and read this article from Boxes and Arrows that recently came across my radar about Advancing Advanced Search. If you are interested in the various ways 'advance' search is approached the article itself is quite useful as are many of the comments that follow. There really is no 'one way' to present advanced searching capabilities to users as it really depends on the users, the data being searched and the technologies but go take a look at some of the examples Steven Turbek highlights.


Over at the Google Labs Experimental page they are always highlighting different things that they are working on and i check in often- but honestly i still stick with the simple google search box (but yes i have learned a lot of advanced commands that i use in the search box because i am just geeky like that). However, every once in a while -quite randomly it seems- i get a glimpse into some new features that they are trying out.

Today's announcement of some new views had an interesting Google Map View search feature which could be useful for searching people, companies, events and places.

From the Google blog post:
Map view Suppose you're scouring the web trying to find out about biology conferences happening in your state. Or you'd like to sit back and enjoy some jazz around town. This information is on the web and accessible through regular web search, but probably spread out over many sites and pages. Unless one of these pages has a map, it might be hard to visualize all the locations at once. Map view solves this problem by plotting some of the key locations contained in your web results onto a map.

Here is a sample search for Web 2.0 conferences in the Bay Area. Ok results but could be better- but it is not all Google's fault.

OK great so what would really make this powerful?

You know how i have been mentioning Microformats and RDFa and other types of data standards that are about adding semantic information to web pages without affecting what the page looks like to the naked eye?

Well as the practice of embedding semantic information is adopted throughout the web community what impact can it have? Well for starters it will make a search tool like what Google Map View is trying to do be a quite powerful way to search for things like conferences, events etc....So for that, the Google is on the map with this one.

Friday, January 18, 2008

Report on the Information Behavior of the Researcher of the Future

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I know you are all scouring the web for good reading material for the weekend and your first stop was here (ha!). So this will probably be good weekend reading if you are interested in the topic of Search as it relates to research. i just browsed through it and saved it to my 'to read weekend' list so i will update this post with my thoughts after reading in-depth.

Via Techmeme, a pointer to the Arstechnica blog which posts about a new briefing report on the habits of the 'Google' generation titled "Information Behavior of the Researcher of the Future".

Information Professionals, have been discussing this topic for a while especially in the corporate research space when users are given access to specialized databases. Although Google has done a lot to make everyone a 'searcher'- i am not convinced that it makes people good searchers and especially not good researchers. But that is really not Google's 'fault'. Google can be a sophisticated search engine if for example the advanced features are used- users are just not trained to take advantage of them. They can certainly try to educate users- for example working with Libraries to provide teaching resources where early search education takes place.

I would read it right now but lunch time is over and i have some work to do before this evening so i can enjoy myself at the Crunchies which by the way you may also be able to view via video stream this evening.

Image: from Arstechnica post but is actually the cover page of the report.

Thursday, January 17, 2008

Oh Glorious Library of Congress and Flickr

2 comments :
How the hell am i going to get through all 3,115 and growing photos ?

Via the Library of Congress Blog and Dave Winer's twitter message (how stoked is he because of FlickrFan) - What an AWESOME use of a Flickr Pro account for the Library of Congress...so glad my taxpayer money is supporting that hefty fee of $24.95 per year ;-) (OK it is a partnership so maybe they aren't paying for a Pro account).

Aside from the fact that we all now have access to great quality images from the archives that many of us would probably never see, the Library of Congress is not only doing this for our own viewing pleasure and to make Dave Winer's photo display application even cooler when we are procrastinating on Flickr - there is a purpose and very important one.

From their blog post:
If all goes according to plan, the project will help address at least two major challenges: how to ensure better and better access to our collections, and how to ensure that we have the best possible information about those collections for the benefit of researchers and posterity. In many senses, we are looking to enhance our metadata.

Imagine telling these young women "Backstage" at the "girlie" show at the Rutland Vermont state fair in 1941 that in 2008, some random person in San Francisco, looking at the photo in the 'cloud' would tag it with the word tuxedo?

Yes. Using user tagging the Library of Congress wants to enhance their metadata. The October/November 2007- Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science and Technology- Special Section on Folksonomies (multiple articles) had a couple of articles on images tagging by end users that addresses tagging images.

Important facts from their FAQs:

Q: How were the items selected/why did you pick these pictures?

A:
We picked two sets of popular images, for which no restrictions on publication or distribution are known, and for which high quality files are available. Because we are also interested in tags and comments on the photos, we picked one set (George Grantham Bain Collection) for which we have minimal identifying information, and another (Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information color photographs) that has some subject indexing.

Calculated choices in order to gather some real use cases for tagging collections. They will be able to compare the usefulness of the tags by matching and comparing a well indexed collection with one that is not.

Q: Will the Library do anything with the tagging info once I add it to the Flickr photos?

A:
The Library will decide what to do with data added through Flickr once the pilot is over. Because resources to update catalog records are limited, the Library cannot promise to incorporate contributed data into its own records.

Can't wait to hear what the final outcome is an how Flickr will be able to provide that data back to the Library of Congress to include 'clean' tags back into their systems.

It also seems that each picture has bibliographic information available (although not segmented but only in the notes field) as follows which is probably the typical current 'catalog' record with their controlled vocabulary (shame that Flickr wasn't able to pre-populate at minimum subject tags)

Delano, Jack,, 1914-, photographer.
"Backstage" at the "girlie" show at the Vermont state fair, Rutland
1941 Sept.
1 slide : color.
Notes:
Title from FSA or OWI agency caption.
Transfer from U.S. Office of War Information, 1944.
Subjects:
Vermont State Fair--(1941 :--Rutland, Vt.)
Fairs
Entertainers
United States--Vermont--Rutland
Format: Slides--Color
Rights Info: No known restrictions on publication.
Repository: Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA, hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.print
Part Of: Farm Security Administration - Office of War Information Collection 11671-3 (DLC) 93845501
General information about the FSA/OWI Color Photographs is available at hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.fsac
Persistent URL: hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/fsac.1a33920
Call Number: LC-USF35-50


***An important Pilot FAQ on their site:
Q: How long will these photos be available on Flickr?
A:
The length of the pilot will be determined by the amount of user interest and tagging activity related to the materials.

Well what are you waiting for? Go check out some great photos and tag your way into metadata history!

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Political Market Prediction Section of CNN Supports OpenID

1 comment :
Via David Recordon's Blog- a pointer to a new site that supports OpenID- the first one i have seen on a main stream media site (please correct me if i am wrong) it is on a specific short term Prediction Market US Presidential Campaign feature on the CNN.com Politics site called CNN Political Markets.

The Service was built by Inkling Markets a provider of a prediction market platform and i suspect that they are also handling the OpenID because their own prediction markets allows OpenID login- so i am not entirely convinced that CNN made a conscious decision on this - yet still find it interesting and hope enough OpenID users sign up so it is successful (yes that means you!).

Prediction Markets 'online games' have been around for a while especially in the financial markets online sector but some companies are also starting to use internally- Inkling provides some examples in their FAQs. Checking the Wikipedia reference also informed me that betting on elections is nothing new "Betting on elections was common in the U.S. until at least the 1940s, with formal markets existing on Wall Street in the months leading up to the race. Newspapers reported market conditions to give a sense of the closeness of the contest in this period prior to widespread polling. The markets involved thousands of participants, had millions of dollars in volume in current terms, and had remarkable predictive accuracy."

But i digress...

I looked at the OpenID site directory that lists known sites that support OpenID and i did not see any other 'main stream' media sites. Looking around the CNN properties i also didn't find additional features like signing up for alerts that supported OpenID.

Last month, Scott Karp at Publishing 2.o wrote a post titled 'What Is The ROI Of Requiring User Registration To Access Online Content? Which takes you through some of his own personal experiences of using the NYT site and questions the ROI of doing so. Will we see OpenId supported by Media sites in the future? The sites would hypothetically still be able to track and target you specifically based on what you do on the site and if your OpenID is tied to for example to your Attention Profile (APML) they can probably even do a better job of targeting not only Advertising but important news that is not on the front page of the site.

The issue of user logins is certainly something i have dealt with over the years. Since i have worked for a content aggregator that provides access to over 10,00 news properties to corporate users for the last 8 years, i know that there is huge value of 'one ID access' (and there are certainly other benefits such as consistent categorization, format and search). From tying into companies corporate single sign-on directories (still don't understand why that is still so hard) to working with clients to build their own systems, like market research portals that 'handle' user seat management the issue is a big one- saving users time, to increase productivity and yes...make more money.

*Warning*- i amongst many others think that usability for 'regular' users for sites that support OpenIP (and CNN is no exception) needs to be addressed- so explore at your own risk of crunched eyebrows! A good pro and con of using OpenId can be found on Lifehacker and if you want a quick tutorial of why and how to use OpenId see Simon Willison's Screencast.

Oh yeah one more thing- i don't speak on behalf of Dow Jones per the statement clearly presented on my site- so just in case you are thinking it, i especially don't speak for WSJ.com- i am pretty sure those folks have no clue i even exist.

UPDATE: January 17th 8amPST- Via Techmeme - Yahoo! Has annouced support for OpenID.

Tuesday, January 15, 2008

A Must See For All DataPortability Video

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Since i posted about being a member of the Data portability WorkGroup last week, i have had interesting conversations with a bunch of people- who basically start off with a what is it all about?

So my explanation really depends on who i am talking to - here are my three categories of conversations so far:

Advocates of Existing Technologies- i talk about the technology stack that the principles of Data Portability are built on with existing open standards like OpenID, RDF, RSS, Microsoformats, APML etc.

Vendors - i talk about the adoption of standards that Data Portability simply puts in context of each other so that they are easier to understand and implement as an end-to-end data portability solution so they don't have to make any costly guesses on what to build.

Users - i talk about the ownership of one's data and the pain that we all feel when having to enter information about ourselves, our friends and our needs over and over and over again.

Well today, the last of these three the 'Users' will also get a link to this awesome video DataPortability - Connect, Control, Share, Remix that Michael Pick from Smashcut Media has put together. Awesome job Michael i look forward to more!

Please check it out and pass it on (and yes is is also useful for Advocates and Vendors!!)

DataPortability - Connect, Control, Share, Remix from Smashcut Media on Vimeo.

Monday, January 14, 2008

2008 Conferences Reference and another example of practical Semantic Data use

1 comment :
Every year i get to go to multiple conferences and there are always more that i would like to go to but just can't. Some of them my company sponsors like Taxonomy Bootcamp, Enterprise Search Summit, FastForward, and SLA (Special Library Association) and many others i get to go to because i think they are going to be educational, interesting and a great way to network.

Frank Gruber just posted a good resource listing a 2008 Web 2.0 & Technology Conference Calendar, that regardless of where you are located you should take a look at because there are some good listings (and others are being added in the comments). According to his feed stats, Frank has over 31,000 readers so obviously i am not the only one that thinks his Blog is a must read.

So as i was leaving Frank a message thanking him for his efforts in aggregating the data, i was thinking -like others who left comments- that it would awesome if you could quickly add things from his blog post to your calendar - like for example Google calendar. (Note: As i was writing this post Frank has added a shared Google Calendar)

So since i have been playing around with Microformats and RDFa, i decided to give the hCalendar Creator a try in order to create an easy way to add events to Calendars from this blog by using the Firefox Operator Add-on (sorry non-geeks but the good news is Firefox 3.0 will support out of box). This Add-on leverages microformats and other semantic data that is available on many web pages and allows viewers to interact with the data. Let me show you.

Using the Creator i copied and pasted some of the events that i am planning on attending into the hCalendar Creator interface which produced code that i embedded directly into my post. One would hope that these tools will eventually be available through all blog software packages- i currently use Blogger (i found this Wordpress plugin)

The code is nicely displayed as follows:

January 14th18th, 2008 MacWorld Conference & Expo– at San Francisco, CA
Immerse yourself in five revitalizing day’s worth of the largest gathering of Mac industry experts, pundits, and enthusiasts. Cultivate fresh skills, nurture new acquaintances, and harvest indispensable tools in which to further feed your imagination and fuel your Mac soul. Watch Steve Jobs' customary keynote address where he usually announces and sometimes unveils new Apple products.

April 10thJanuary 15th, 2008 Information Architecture Summit 2008– at Miami, FL
A premier gathering place for information architects and for discussion about information architecture. Everyone who touches on IA is welcome to share and learn. Last year's IA Summit attracted over 500 attendees, including beginners, experienced IAs, and people in a range of related fields. This year's tagline/theme is "Experiencing Information."
Tags: Assist IA

April 22th25th, 2008 Web 2.0 Expo 2008– at San Francisco, CA
A companion event to the Web 2.0 Summit, Web 2.0 Expo is the first event specifically designed to help teach Web 2.0 techniques and best practices to people in the trenches directly involved in the design, development, engineering, marketing, and business of second-generation internet technology.

These hCalendar events brought to you by the hCalendar Creator.


Once i embedded the code into the post- my Operator Plugin immediately picked up that on the page there were 3 events as you see in the tool bar below- hoovering over the event gives me options to Export the Event, Bookmark it or add it to a calendar (supported by Google/Yahoo!)

Franks page, because it does not have any Semantic information does not show any events per the image below.

Now if i published my hCard as well then someone visiting my blog could easy say- hey i am going to that event as well and i would love to meet Daniela, let me quickly add her to my contacts and send her a meeting invite for when i will be at the event.


I know that i am probably over simplifying Microformats (although the seem simple enough to understand) but i hope i make the point that semantic data like what Microformats provides is extremely valuable as we create more and more content- and yes i know i am over simplifying because i had read through the beginning chapters of the Microformat book and this blog which i hacked together so it wouldn't show a blogger tool bar on top is certainly not a properly formatted site!

Sunday, January 13, 2008

Resources from recent Webcast: Folksonomies and Taxonomies in the Enterprise

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As i had announced on this blog back in December i was asked by the Dow Jones Info Pro Alliance group to conduct a Webcast on Folksonomies and Taxonomies in the Enterprise. One of the group's outreach programs is the Info Pro Alliance portal which provides various resources for information professionals in the Enterprise space. I used this opportunity to share some of the information discussed at the recent round table event we coordinated here in Silicon Valley and to share some of the things i have come across in the last year in this space. It was OK- i wouldn't say it was my best 'performance'!

As part of the follow up i have created a Wiki for the community to participate and share with each other on the rather new topic of using both Folksonomies and Taxonomies in the Enterprise. From the Wiki you can also link to the recorded Webcast or the Slide deck that i have posted on Slideshare. I still have a lot to do on the Wiki (e.g. finishing the Q&A from the session)- but i hope that others will also assist in making the Wiki a useful place for those who are interested in the topic. If you know someone in the Enterprise that is looking into Folksonomies please send them a link to the Wiki (thanks!).

If this is a subject of interest, please be sure to check out the wiki and share additional resources or thoughts on the issue.

Many thanks to Lorraine Bell for all her assistance in coordinating this WebCast!

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Microsoft Guns for Google with targeted recruiting efforts

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Have you ever gotten a call from a recruiter at a certain massive company in Mountainview, CA and wondered out loud who does their own department recruiting because obviously the person on the other line had done no homework whatsoever in reviewing what you or the company you currently work at do? They probably didn't even 'google' your name. I have been on the other side and it is painful and honestly we have all been on the phone with recruiters so they aren't the only ones.

Especially in the technology world recruiting can be cut throat when bidding for the right candidate and the recruiter better be prepared to not only have done their homework on the candidate but also on the company they work at, and their competitors who may also be bidding for that worker especially for fancy college graduates.

eWeek's Joe Wilcox who covers Microsoft recorded this podcast with Ruth Van Dyke, Microsoft's Staffing Research & Competitive Intelligence manager, and Arthur Rassias, vice president of Dow Jones Enterprise Media Group Client Solutions, in which they discuss how the Microsoft implemented a rich content driven recruiting system using Dow Jones services. I happen to be the person that worked very closely with Ruth to gather the groups requirements and make recommendations for a multiple phases so I am particularly pleased with the outcome and happy that Microsoft is seeing benefits from the solution.

The full case study with additional details is available here.

Tuesday, January 08, 2008

Another Semantic Web short video introduction: RDFa

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I am increasingly becoming a semantic web junkie (we might have to call for an intervention) and one of my fixes has been Danny Ayers' 'This Weeks Semantic Web" weekly post which provides selected links related to Semantic Web Technologies. I admit it takes me most of the week to get through everything and some of it goes right over my head- but i always find gems.

This evening on that list, i found another short video from the folks at Digital Bazaar who produced this simple Semantic Web introduction, this time describing RDFa. I think that this new way of presenting concepts is awesome and i am glad to see many folks utilizing this methods (hats off i think goes to Michael Wesch for his inspirational "Web 2.0 ... The Machine is Us/ing Us" YouTube video which now has 4,195,123 views!!)

RDFa stands for 'RDF in HTML Attributes'. It is supposed to empower bloggers and web designers to add semantic information to web pages without affecting what the page looks. So RDFa is basically Semantic HTML. It allows you to add extra “structure” in your HTML to indicate a calendar event, contact information, a document license, etc… RDFa is about total publisher control: you choose which attributes to use, which to reuse from other sites, and how to evolve, over time, the meaning of these attributes.




Adding semantic content to web pages is extremely beneficial whether using RDFa or other standards like Microformats. (I am trying to get my head around the pro and cons of each, how they could be used jointly etc. RDFa is sported by the W3C while Microformats has grown out of Microformats.org and the developer community. i got myself the Microformats book for christmas but haven't had the chance to get far).

So here is a practical example using RDFa but which could probably be accomplished with hCalendar as well.

Over at the Taxonomy Warehouse which is a Dow Jones property that i am now actively working with in my new role, there is a page for events that has been hard coded. At some of these events someone from Dow Jones will be there and others we won't. Using RDFa as a method to publish an event, a user using a RDFa-enabled web browser (currently available as plugins) notices a calendar icon next to the event description. By clicking on it, she gets the option to add the event to her calendar of choice. In addition a predicate (you did watch the video already didn't you??) can be presented to the visitor that is adding the event to her calendar that states something like daniela:attendee and allows the user to invite me to meet up with them at the conference- potentially sending me an invite during a break in the conference proceeding because the conference agenda was also published with RDFa and linked. Fantasy? I don't believe it will be for long.

Some heavy hitters join Dataportability.org Workgroup: Google, Facebook, Plaxo

2 comments :
Taking a quick break from the daily chores to highlight this fairly big news announcement coming out of the Dataportability Workgroup that Google, Facebook and Plaxo have joined the workgroup today. I am an active member of the DP Workgroup** so congrats to all involved!

The DataPortability Workgroup is, among other things, actively working to create the 'DataPortability Reference Design' to document the best practices for integrating existing open standards and protocols for maximum interoperability.

Yeah so what does that mean for you? Basically that users will be able to access their social data eventually across all the applications, social networking sites and widgets that implement these designs into their systems and importantly companies who are implementing services will have standards to adopt to ensure maximum accountability and usability.

The technologies that the DataPortability workgroup are advocating are not necessarily "new" or propriety- they include existing open standards that you might have already heard of like RDF, RSS, OpenID, Microformats and others. The objective is to create a stack of services that support dataportabilty.

Techcrunch coverage here and ReadWriteWeb's coverage. Why is this a big deal?

The DP Workgroup over the last few months have been implementing and supporting some great initiatives just take a look at the conversations over at the Dataportability Google Group so why will the addition of Google, Facebook, Plaxo and hopefully others be a big deal? Well, who are the biggest players that hold most of your data online? Google is probably the biggest and Facebook, and Plaxo are just some of the others biggies. This is great news.


**NOTE**I have been a Dataportability Workgroup member from the beginning thanks to my involvement with APML and Chris Saad's (the DP Workgroup's chair and Particls CEO) excellent support and inclusion. Although i work for Dow Jones, being a member of the DP Workgroup does not imply that Dow Jones itself is currently supporting the Workgroup (but we are active W3C members and supporters of standards like RDF). I understand that the new members from Google, Facebook and Plaxo however are representing their companies.

Monday, January 07, 2008

Sexy Hot Trends for 2008 and Beyond- Librarians

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I would like to start off this post by saying that even last year and the year before and the years before that i have always thought Librarians were hot (and that i put the world sexy in the title to drive traffic)- but it certainly puts a smile on my face when i see the topic coming up in blogs recently and agree with the trends that we are seeing.

No one can dispute that the skills that Librarians have are becoming more valuable as more and more content is being produced on the Internet and sense needs to be made out of it.

When i first went to Library School i was pretty sure i didn't want to sit behind the reference desk- but i really didn't know what i wanted to do or what a MLIS (Master of Library & Information Science) would equipment me for. I had a strong feeling that it was what i wanted to do so i trudged through all my classes - sometimes bored out of my mind and sometimes fascinated - but always learning important principles of information finding and i admit i cried after my cataloging final (but got a B anyway!). An adjunct professor by the name of Doug Riecken from IBM Watson Research turned me on to intelligent agents and Marvin Minsky and it was enough to convince me that this was the right path for me.

The hot trend we are seeing is that Librarians, Information Professionals, Information Scientists etc. (those with MLIS background) are increasingly being recognized as having important skills sets for dealing with the information overload. It really isn't a new trend, I think one of the earliest cheerleaders of Librarians on the internet was Peter Morville ( a Librarian himself and one of my heroes). I recently re-listened to the Talking with Talis podcast from this summer in which Morville ends the conversation by explaining why people should definitely consider a career in Library Science.

The hipness facture however probably started last year with this article in the New York Times back in July on "A Hipper Crowd of Shushers"- wow cool people are librarians as well!

Over on ReadWriteWeb Marshal Kirkpatrick blogged about the hotness of Librarians twice first with Sexy Librarians of the Future Will Help You Upload Your Videos to YouTube where he writes a sample scenario about how Librarians can make the social content you are producing more valuable by addressing findability aspects. He also embeds a quick 3 minute section of an interview that Microsoft's Jon Udell did on the Talking With Talis podcast (these guys are everywhere!) in which Udell talks about how "the librarian of the future will help a growing number of citizen media producers to classify their online media and get it connected to other related content in ways that will increase its discoverability". And the second post highlighting a recent Pew Internet study that highlights that the Library and the Librarian are far from extinct (although many follow up conversations are questioning why young people are going to the physical library).

So when issues of privacy come up like those that have been raised by the recent Scoble Facebook incident why wouldn't we look at some of the principles that Librarians have established and continue to fight for? Who among them have not, at one point or another fought for the privacy of their patron's data without limiting access to information? Starting in the 1930's the American Library Association (ALA) recognized the need for librarians to take privacy issues seriously and they have never stopped.

As Librarians create and participate in online communities they are acutely aware of the issues of privacy and are applying those well learned privacy skills to these new domains. I just pulled this report from OCLC (Online Computer Library Center) Sharing, Privacy and Trust in Our Networked World- relevant chapter that i reviewed Privacy Security and Trust provides an interesting look at the topic from a global perspective across a large age set of over 6,500 participants addressing privacy rules (starts pg. 16)
  • The majority of respondents feel that it is important to have controls over their personal information on the Internet, such as the ability to remain anonymous, specifying who can use and view it, and knowing there are privacy policies in place.
  • Respondents frequently do not take advantage of privacy controls that are available.
  • Respondents want to control their identities online; they want to remain informed on how their information will be used and they want to be able to set parameters around who can view and who can use their personal information
  • Less than 40% of total respondents review privacy policies on social networking, social media, commercial and library sites before registering


I would like to see some of these Library organizations participate in the Dataportability.org initiatives that are starting to take shape so we can leverage their experience with issues of discoverabilty, sharing and privacy. That would be Hot!

(note: i am one of the original Dataportability workgroup members but not on behalf of any organization)

And i just had to add this: While searching for sexy librarians, I found this great site by a fellow Rutgers SCILS alumni and author Holly Black- Librarians are Sexy, Smart, Radical, Famous (did you know Karl Marx was one?).

Super Librarian Image above is from from the NJ State Library which includes the great Super Librarian Comic Book . You can also buy Super Librarian gear if you are so inclined.

Saturday, January 05, 2008

Dada Album Cover Meme

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I was without power from Friday 2am to Saturday 12pm due to the storms in the Bay area- which meant no access to the internet (even our cell service was down so no BlackBerry browser either). I however was happy as a clam to have no access which is so very unlike me, but no worries i am back after reading a short book, all the back issues of the Economist and some serious Monopoly candle light games (which i dominated)- ready to cruise the web again and get some work done. But my first stop was my Google Reader which brought me to this Danny Ayers post on a dada album cover meme - so of course i had to play along with the others.

I got:
Here is the original meme instrucitons:
  1. The first article title on the Wikipedia Random Articles page is the name of your band.
  2. The last four words of the very last quotation on the Random Quotations page is the title of your album.
  3. The third picture in Flickr's Interesting Photos From The Last 7 Days will be your album cover. (see above i used a search for CreativeCommons tag and made sure to attribute)
  4. Use your graphics programme of choice to throw them together, and post the result.
Good Meme by all means and certainly and interesting way to get a band name for those struggling out there.

Wednesday, January 02, 2008

Top Ten Lists not only a Fascination but an Ideal Way to Consume Certain Types of Content

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While many of us are reading through end of year top ten lists or 2008 top trends lists, Craig Roth over at Knowledge Forward blog has a post on "Why Do we Care About Top 10 Lists" that outlines some key ideas as to why we all love top ten lists and how editorialized lists are ideal ways to consume certain types of content.

I tend to agree with Roth that the “top 10 list” phenomenon is a good analogy to what some "technologies at the intersection of portals, RSS, and social software are trying to do: filter out all the noise and just bring me the important information, encapsulated, all in one handy spot. It is a commonly recognizable form of attention management".

Roth outlines the typical process of compiling lists as follows:

Integration: Connecting up with all the event streams, information sources, and data

Categorization: Determining what subject the event falls into

Rating: Prioritizing this bit of news. This is probably the toughest part of the process at the moment, but attempts have been made in the form of social ratings engines (Digg) and attention profiling (APML).

Personalization: Lining up the category against the set of subjects that you are personally interested in, either through explicit declaration or implicitly.

Display: A UI that presents the user with capsules on each of the items and allows the user to notice, track, and manage the information

In the Enterprise when the need exceeds preset filters, there are usually people who are tasked with going through this process or sometimes the process is hired out to a 3rd party. In the consumer space, as new functionality like the Google Shared feeds is made available we will find people we trust to become our subject domain experts. There are also technologies like APML (Attention Profile Markup Language) that is mentioned in the post and i have been posting on along with many other bloggers that could facilitate the creation of 'top lists' based on our attention.

From his About page, Craig is currently with the Burton Group as an analyst covering enterprise portals, content globalization, collaboration platforms, attention management (information overload, interruption science), virtual worlds, and the executive view of collaboration.

Tuesday, January 01, 2008

Synaptica from Dow Jones Taxonomy and Metadata Management

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April 2008-If you have found this post it was posted out of date sequence in order for me to quickly link to a written description of Synaptica a Taxonomy and Metadata Management tool that i am the Business Development Manager for at Dow Jones. At this point they are redesigning the Synaptica web presence which means that this data is not easily available for me to link to (aside from putting it on my on web server)- problem resolved temporarily and please note i might make changes here.

Synaptica is the result of over a decade of continuous research and development driven by power-users in the information management and library communities. An unparalleled set of features has evolved to meet the uncompromising demands of taxonomy and authority file experts:

• Manage glossaries, dictionaries, lexicons, taxonomies, thesauri, ontologies and name authority files
• Supports ANSI/NISO Z39.19; ISO 2788 & ISO 5964
• Simple search or power search modes
• Standard hierarchical, associative and equivalency relationships
• Customizable semantic relationship types and behavior rules
• Meta vocabulary clusters and crosswalk mapping
• Multiple categories for a single term
• Expandable hierarchies and relationships
• Approval & candidate term statuses
• Customizable data entry templates and rules
• Dynamically enforced rules-based logic
• Collaborative and compartmentalized portals
• Role-based granular permissions
• Robust scalable enterprise-class architecture
• Web Services remote data access and write control
• DBMS deployment on Oracle and SQL Server
• COM and Database APIs for systems integration
• Logical delete and restore of terms
• User ID and date-time stamping
• Online reports using report wizards
• Bulk import and validation functions
• Various export formats including, MS Word and Excel, CSV, XML; ZTHES, RDF SKOS and OWL
• Unicode UTF-8 support for non-western character sets


Web-based User Interface

The entire Synaptica application has a web-based user interface enabling access by location independent knowledge workers. A “portal” system allows project teams to access subsets of the vocabularies with user functional privileges controlled by 12 permissions levels from read-only through super-administrator. A suite of online report wizards allows users to create alphabetical and hierarchical reports as well as various export formats including CSV, XML; ZTHES, RDF SKOS and OWL


On-the-fly Customization
Another of Synaptica’s strengths is the ability to customize the system in minutes. An extensive menu of administrator’s tools, all fully accessible via the web-UI, allows users to: create new vocabulary files; define the metadata elements; create new kinds of semantic relationship types; configure rules-bases to govern semantic and taxonomic house-rules; customize display formats and perform data import functions.

Enterprise Scalability
Synaptica provides an enterprise-class solution for authority file and controlled vocabulary management. The system uses a library of COM business objects, which can be accessed through the web-application or via an API. The system supports SQL Server and Oracle databases scalable for multiple users and millions of terms and relationships. A library of stored procedures supports native database API integration.

Onsite or Remote-Hosting
Synaptica is a client-server web application that can be installed locally on a client’s intranet or extranet server. Alternatively, Dow Jones can host client systems on our secure servers, which means the client needs no special equipment. In either case, systems use password-protected accounts, so users can access all of Synaptica's features from anywhere in the world using standard personal computers and web-browsers.



Dow Jones Client Solutions Taxonomy Consulting

Dow Jones Taxonomy Services consultants help organizations to build, deploy and maintain working taxonomies tailored to their individual needs. We provide:
  • proven experience at gaining senior management and inter-departmental commitment on quality benchmarks and ways of measuring return on investment,
  • cost-saving approaches and tools, and advice on the benefits and disadvantages of the different approaches;
  • knowledge of resource allocation and elapsed time for taxonomy projects,
  • And practical assistance with taxonomy design, development and implementation best-practice advice, practical tips and "war stories" to help you avoid project pitfalls and speed up project completion

Consultants work with clients on a modular basis in the key project phases of assessment, design, delivery, adoption and maintenance. The level of service is matched to your needs and resources.

Dow Jones Taxonomy Development Services: Helping you build or customize taxonomies

Dow Jones Client Solutions (DJCS) manages one of the largest dedicated global taxonomy resource teams, providing editorial expertise across multiple industry sectors. From the creation of precisely tuned authority files to the development of large-scale taxonomies across multiple domains, including ongoing maintenance, DJCS can be your service partner for outsourced taxonomy and controlled vocabulary development.

Twine Preview by Nova Spivack with Robert Scoble

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If you have been keeping an eye on Semantic Web tools you probably have heard about Radar Networks' Twine platform and have also signed up for the Twine Beta which we all are eagerly awaiting access to. Catching up on my videos this afternoon i was pleased to see that Nova Spivack recently did a interview with Robert Scoble that provides an online demo of what Twine is about- straight from the horses mouth.

I tried to embed the video, but the podtech embed code was not working so here is the link to the complete version or if you short on time a 10minute version is also available.

According to Spivack, Twine will be a hosted services that will be free for individuals (Ad supported) for public use and there will be pro and corporate access accounts (details not available yet and no discussion of enterprise version but obviously there is a huge market there for Twine). Scoble as usual asks some good questions around what the application will support and a lot of the answers are of the 'not yet but we will' status but that is to be expected.

Semantic Web applications have been somewhat sci-fi, not because of the technologies per se but because a lot of the data that would make them truly valuable to the user has not been easily available, but soon like Richard McManus predicts they will become popular and successful due to their ability to get better content results and make better data connections as a lot of web sites and services that provide content adopt some of the standards like GRDDL, (which allows people to publish data in their traditional formats, such as HTML or XML, and specifies how these data can be translated into RDF.) that Spivack mentions in the video. These standards that the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) is developing along with other initiatives like dataportability.org are making the Semantic Web more accessible and easy to use. Twine looks to be at the forefront- i will report back once i finally get access.