[Geowanking] Web 3.0 may be here
SteveC
steve at asklater.com
Wed May 6 16:14:44 PDT 2009
On 6 May 2009, at 15:30, R E Sieber wrote:
> Well someone's believing in it enough to give it enormous publicity
> and, I'm guessing, wads of cash.
Er no, the Wolfram thing is by no stretch of the imagination the web
of data, it's a big datastore they own and run.
>
> Renee
>
> SteveC wrote:
>>
>> On 4 May 2009, at 08:44, Ed Parsons wrote:
>>
>>> The general scepticism here I think is well placed, semantic based
>>> systems always demo well, the key to more widespread adoption is
>>> the automation of the still largely manual creation of ontological
>>> relationships. But one day I'm sure this will work, after-all TBL
>>> is usually right.
>>
>> Come on, nobody believes the web of data stuff anymore surely. If
>> they did someone would do something like RDF but actually usable
>> and easily implementable in actual HTML.
>>
>>
>>> ed
>>>
>>> On 4 May 2009, at 06:59, R E Sieber wrote:
>>>
>>>> Because I do geospatial ontologies, I'm skeptical of anything
>>>> that attempts to automate semantics. However, ontologies are
>>>> incredibly top-heavy in design. Anything that could marshall user
>>>> generated content in the structuring of semantics, even if it's
>>>> mostly vaporware, could represent an advance.
>>>>
>>>> I also do some cyberinfrastructure stuff and ain't nothing that's
>>>> going to reach into private databases, particularly spatial ones,
>>>> without tons of standardization, web services that sit on top of
>>>> each, schema, etc. Still if they had something better than
>>>> something like D2R, I'd be very happy.
>>>>
>>>> Renee
>>>>
>>>> Andrew Johnson wrote:
>>>>> We'll see if this ends up being another Cuil, or another useful
>>>>> tool. Either way, it's certainly not going to live up to the
>>>>> hype or have very far-reaching effects.
>>>>>
>>>>> There's nothing new about curating a big set of data and
>>>>> wrapping a nice GUI around it, not even if you write the whole
>>>>> thing in Mathematica. The talking heads are going bonkers over
>>>>> it, but the tech community, the actual programmers and
>>>>> engineers, is a mix of wait-and-see, and outright scorn.
>>>>>
>>>>> How could a piece of vaporware called a Knowledge Computation
>>>>> Engine really do anything besides hiss and steam?
>>>>>
>>>>> Andrew
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Sun, May 3, 2009 at 9:17 PM, R E Sieber <resieber at gmail.com <mailto:resieber at gmail.com
>>>>> >> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Holy @#%$^! I want the API - Renee
>>>>>
>>>>> (Note how much of this is about semantic searches of geography.)
>>>>>
>>>>> May 3, 2009
>>>>> http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/an-invention-that-could-change-the-internet-for-ever-1678109.html
>>>>>
>>>>> An invention that could change the internet for ever
>>>>> Revolutionary new web software could put giants such as Google in
>>>>> the shade when it comes out later this month. Andrew Johnson
>>>>> reports
>>>>>
>>>>> The biggest internet revolution for a generation will be unveiled
>>>>> this month with the launch of software that will understand
>>>>> questions and give specific, tailored answers in a way that the
>>>>> web has never managed before.
>>>>>
>>>>> The new system, Wolfram Alpha, showcased at Harvard University in
>>>>> the US last week, takes the first step towards what many consider
>>>>> to be the internet's Holy Grail – a global store of information
>>>>> that understands and responds to ordinary language in the same
>>>>> way
>>>>> a person does.
>>>>>
>>>>> Although the system is still new, it has already produced massive
>>>>> interest and excitement among technology pundits and internet
>>>>> watchers.
>>>>>
>>>>> Computer experts believe the new search engine will be an
>>>>> evolutionary leap in the development of the internet. Nova
>>>>> Spivack, an internet and computer expert, said that Wolfram Alpha
>>>>> could prove just as important as Google. "It is really impressive
>>>>> and significant," he wrote. "In fact it may be as important for
>>>>> the web (and the world) as Google, but for a different purpose.
>>>>>
>>>>> Tom Simpson, of the blog Convergenceofeverything.com, said: "What
>>>>> are the wider implications exactly? A new paradigm for using
>>>>> computers and the web? Probably. Emerging artificial intelligence
>>>>> and a step towards a self-organising internet? Possibly... I
>>>>> think
>>>>> this could be big."
>>>>>
>>>>> Wolfram Alpha will not only give a straight answer to questions
>>>>> such as "how high is Mount Everest?", but it will also produce a
>>>>> neat page of related information – all properly sourced – such as
>>>>> geographical location and nearby towns, and other mountains,
>>>>> complete with graphs and charts.
>>>>>
>>>>> The real innovation, however, is in its ability to work things
>>>>> out
>>>>> "on the fly", according to its British inventor, Dr Stephen
>>>>> Wolfram. If you ask it to compare the height of Mount Everest to
>>>>> the length of the Golden Gate Bridge, it will tell you. Or ask
>>>>> what the weather was like in London on the day John F Kennedy was
>>>>> assassinated, it will cross-check and provide the answer. Ask it
>>>>> about D sharp major, it will play the scale. Type in "10 flips
>>>>> for
>>>>> four heads" and it will guess that you need to know the
>>>>> probability of coin-tossing. If you want to know when the next
>>>>> solar eclipse over Chicago is, or the exact current location of
>>>>> the International Space Station, it can work it out.
>>>>>
>>>>> Dr Wolfram, an award-winning physicist who is based in America,
>>>>> added that the information is "curated", meaning it is assessed
>>>>> first by experts. This means that the weaknesses of sites such as
>>>>> Wikipedia, where doubts are cast on the information because
>>>>> anyone
>>>>> can contribute, are taken out. It is based on his best-selling
>>>>> Mathematica software, a standard tool for scientists, engineers
>>>>> and academics for crunching complex maths.
>>>>>
>>>>> "I've wanted to make the knowledge we've accumulated in our
>>>>> civilisation computable," he said last week. "I was not sure it
>>>>> was possible. I'm a little surprised it worked out so well."
>>>>>
>>>>> Dr Wolfram, 49, who was educated at Eton and had completed his
>>>>> PhD
>>>>> in particle physics by the time he was 20, added that the launch
>>>>> of Wolfram Alpha later this month would be just the beginning of
>>>>> the project.
>>>>>
>>>>> "It will understand what you are talking about," he said. "We are
>>>>> just at the beginning. I think we've got a reasonable start on 90
>>>>> per cent of the shelves in a typical reference library."
>>>>>
>>>>> The engine, which will be free to use, works by drawing on the
>>>>> knowledge on the internet, as well as private databases. Dr
>>>>> Wolfram said he expected that about 1,000 people would be needed
>>>>> to keep its databases updated with the latest discoveries and
>>>>> information.
>>>>>
>>>>> He also added that he would not go down the road of storing
>>>>> information on ordinary people, although he was aware that others
>>>>> might use the technology to do so.
>>>>>
>>>>> Wolfram Alpha has been designed with professionals and academics
>>>>> in mind, so its grasp of popular culture is, at the moment,
>>>>> comparatively poor. The term "50 Cent" caused "absolute horror"
>>>>> in
>>>>> tests, for example, because it confused a discussion on currency
>>>>> with the American rap artist. For this reason alone it is
>>>>> unlikely
>>>>> to provide an immediate threat to Google, which is working on a
>>>>> similar type of search engine, a version of which it launched
>>>>> last
>>>>> week.
>>>>>
>>>>> "We have a certain amount of popular culture information," Dr
>>>>> Wolfram said. "In some senses popular culture information is much
>>>>> more shallowly computable, so we can find out who's related to
>>>>> who
>>>>> and how tall people are. I fully expect we will have lots of
>>>>> popular culture information. There are linguistic horrors because
>>>>> if you put in books and music a lot of the names clash with other
>>>>> concepts."
>>>>>
>>>>> He added that to help with that Wolfram Alpha would be using
>>>>> Wikipedia's popularity index to decide what users were likely to
>>>>> be interested in.
>>>>>
>>>>> With Google now one of the world's top brands, worth $100bn,
>>>>> Wolfram Alpha has the potential to become one of the biggest
>>>>> names
>>>>> on the planet.
>>>>>
>>>>> Dr Wolfram, however, did not rule out working with Google in the
>>>>> future, as well as Wikipedia. "We're working to partner with all
>>>>> possible organisations that make sense," he said. "Search,
>>>>> narrative, news are complementary to what we have. Hopefully
>>>>> there
>>>>> will be some great synergies."
>>>>>
>>>>> What the experts say
>>>>>
>>>>> "For those of us tired of hundreds of pages of results that do
>>>>> not
>>>>> really have a lot to do with what we are trying to find out,
>>>>> Wolfram Alpha may be what we have been waiting for."
>>>>>
>>>>> Michael W Jones, Tech.blorge.com <http://Tech.blorge.com>
>>>>>
>>>>> "If it is not gobbled up by one of the industry superpowers, his
>>>>> company may well grow to become one of them in a small number of
>>>>> years, with most of us setting our default browser to be Wolfram
>>>>> Alpha."
>>>>>
>>>>> Doug Lenat, Semanticuniverse.com
>>>>>
>>>>> "It's like plugging into an electric brain."
>>>>>
>>>>> Matt Marshall, Venturebeat.com
>>>>>
>>>>> "This is like a Holy Grail... the ability to look inside data
>>>>> sources that can't easily be crawled and provide answers from
>>>>> them."
>>>>>
>>>>> Danny Sullivan, editor-in-chief of searchengineland.com
>>>>> <http://searchengineland.com>
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>>> http://geowanking.org/mailman/listinfo/geowanking_geowanking.org
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
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>>>
>>>
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>>
>> Best
>>
>> Steve
>>
>>
>
>
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Best
Steve
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