
Sir Tim Berners-Lee: Semantic Web is open for business - cawel
http://blogs.zdnet.com/semantic-web/?p=105
======
bct
Wow, a Semantic Web article that focuses on the real issue (convincing sites
to share their data), debunks the "it's about marking up HTML" myth, and
doesn't make any ridiculous claims for or against it.

I'm impressed.

------
myoung8
Can someone give an example of a practical application of the semantic web?

~~~
derefr
The basic point, as far as I can tell, is to decentralize regular data--that
is, instead of having to go to eBay to list an item for sale, you list it on
_your_ page, and eBay simply spiders it, picks it up as "for sale", and lists
it. Instead of keeping your own private database, you'd basically be using the
entire Internet as your dataset.

Any uses I thought of except that one were just as easily accomplished by
having a public API to your web application, which nearly serves the same
purpose. The only difference is that the semantic markup formats are "true
standards" for accessing the data thus contained, rather than ad-hoc
specifying one for every application you create.

~~~
bct
Besides decentralization, it's about making connections between two datasets
without either dataset having to know about the other.

There's a certain minimum effort required to make it worthwhile to write a web
application with a public API; combining and querying two distinct datasets
that already exist is below that bar.

