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Web 3.0: what it means for journalists (part 2)

Posted: 24/10/08 By: Colin Meek

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Following 'Web 3.0: what it means for journalists (part 1)' and Journalism.co.uk's interview with John Breslin, founder of the Semantically-Interlinked Online Communities project (SIOC), on the Insite blog, here's an overview of some of the most important semantic web applications for journalists.

Twine.com
Twine, for example, is a new social bookmarking site underpinned with semantic technology. For journalists it is Facebook on steroids.

Through Twine you can join groups (called Twines) where people post interesting links, bookmarks and resources on specific topics as diverse as the 'Financial Crisis' and 'Beer'. Based on your activity and items you have bookmarked, the site 'recommends' twines, connections with other members and other items people have saved.

Users don't see the Natural Language Processing employed, only the functionality. David Provost is author of the Semantic Business blog and the analysis 'On the Cusp: A Global Review of the Semantic Web Industry' published in September.

In his report Provost describes how people linger on 'discovery' sites such as delicious and digg for around two minutes per session, yet Twine members hang around for a whopping 15.

Breslin thinks Twine is the most exciting semantic product to emerge in the last year. Another newcomer in this space to watch is Freebase.

The Semantic Radar
This free Firefox plugin cleverly lets you know when you happen upon a page that contains semantic web data. You can then click on the icon at the bottom of your browser to explore the data in more detail.

For example, the semantic icon should appear when you navigate to any Livejournal profile page. If you click the Friend of a Friend (FOAF) logo then that FOAF profile, as explained in part one of this series, should display.

"I think that people are tired of repeating the same information in multiple places, and through standard sign-on systems like OpenID and profile representation mechanisms like FOAF, you can allow someone to define their identity and to reuse it wherever they choose to use it," says Breslin.

The Semantic Radar reveals how the semantic web creates another layer of data which journalists may be able to tap in order to determine relationships and connections.

ClearForest Gnosis
The free Gnosis Firefox browser plugin allows you to 'process' a webpage using a button in the browser Gnosis sidebar.

After a few seconds the page identifies key factual information on that page, such as names. You can then hover your cursor over these highlights and a pop-up window appears allowing you to search for that term in sites like LinkedIn, Reuters, Google, Wikipedia and Technorati.

Gnosis uses the same technology as The Calais Initiative (below) and ClearForest is owned by Thomson Reuters.

While not universally praised in reviews, this plugin gives users a real taste of the type of tool the semantic web will make routine. More powerful updates could, for example, give you the option of actual search results from Wikipedia or relevant news sites.

Headup
This is an extremely powerful new launch that is currently only in private beta but you can apply to join. Like Gnosis, it layers more information onto the webpage you are looking at so that you don't have to navigate away. This time, however, it uses information from your social network accounts to make recommendations and more.

Semantic web search
The ability to search the semantic web again demonstrates how this layer of information may soon be tapped to provide much richer search results.

When you obtain someone's FOAF profile, for example, you can also see their interests and friends. Blogging platforms Livejournal and Vox, among others, export profiles in FOAF files that are found by semantic web search tools.

Semantic web search tools trawl the web for the factual items such as FOAF files, but also names, dates and locations. This information can then be used by developers who want readable data – irrespective of its point of origin.

Semantic web search tools include the SWSE search engine and Sindice. Results from Sindice are being used to improve web applications by providing enhanced information about events, people and any number of other facts. Keyword searches in Sindice and SWSE are interesting, but they are not yet geared up for lay users.

The Calais Initiative
Opencalais also has the power of Thomson Reuters behind it and offers a range of free tools for publishers, bloggers and other content providers.

The free service uses Natural Language Processing to analyse content or documents. It identifies names, places, facts and events and embeds this 'metadata' in a way that allows it to be linked or 'meshed' with other data in exciting ways.

For example, some publishers are feeding their entire historical archive of material through Calais to be tagged which means it can be filtered and searched more easily. Although these tools aren't of immediate use to most journalists, the scale of this project reveals how many content providers are turning to this technology to make sure their content can be found in the new semantic world.

Knowing this, journalists can exploit new tools to more effectively search for the semantic metadata.

Search Monkey
Search Monkey is Yahoo's invitation to third-party developers to build the next generation of search results using the Yahoo platform based on semantic projects such as FOAF and SIOC.

As Yahoo announced earlier this year, instead of search results consisting of the usual simple title, abstract and URL 'for the first time users will see rich results that incorporate the massive amount of data buried in websites - ratings and reviews, images, deep links, and all kinds of other useful data - directly on the Yahoo Search results page.'

Developers have jumped at the chance. Go to the Yahoo Search Gallery for ways to enhance your Yahoo search.

Privacy
Privacy in relation to the semantic web is one issue that won't be resolved soon. The reality is that social network sites often want the information in their databases to be accessible across the web, but their members may not.

Breslin told us that he is certain people won't be aware that many sites are making semantic forms of their content available which can be reused elsewhere. Some have turned off FOAF exports after complaints.

"There certainly has to be more thought put into educating users towards having opt-in/opt-out mechanisms when implementing semantic exports, especially for personal content and profiles," he says.

Got a story? Email our news team: Laura Oliver; Judith Townend or telephone +44 (0)1273 384290. You can also follow us on Twitter: @journalismnews / @LauraOliver / @JTownend.