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Semantic Web Getting Real

Posted by kdawson on from the open-it-up-and-give-it-away dept.

BlueSalamander writes "Tim O'Reilly just did an interview with Devin Wenig, the CEO-designate of Reuters. With no great enthusiasm I started to read yet another interview on how the semantic web was going to make everything great for everybody. Wenig made some good points about the end of the latency wars in news and the beginning of the battle for automatically detecting linkages and connections in the news. Smart news, not just fast news. Great stuff — but just more words? Nope — a little searching revealed that Reuters just opened access to their corporate semantic technology crown jewels. For free. For anyone. Their Calais API lets you turn unstructured text into a formal RDF graph in about one second. I ran about 5,000 documents through it and played with a subset of them in RDF-Gravity. The results were impressive overall. Is this the start of the semantic web getting real? When big names and big money start to act, not just talk, it may be time to pay attention. Semantic applications anyone? The foundation appears to be here."

9 of 135 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Semantic Spam by Reverend528 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Well, as long as the spammers stick to the spec and use the type for their content, then it should be pretty easy to filter.

    --
    Badass Resumes
  2. Anti- Semantic comments in 3 ... 2 ... 1 ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    And now for a host of Anti-Semantic comments in 3 ... 2 ... 1 ...

    Well, I am sure the authors will just call them Anti-Zio[a]ntic comments.

  3. Great, just great ... by ScrewMaster · · Score: 4, Funny

    Semantic Web Getting Real

    Just what we need. Yet another version of RealPlayer.

    --
    The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
  4. pfft... by djupedal · · Score: 3, Funny

    "Wenig made some good points about the end of the latency wars..."

    Mr. Wenig must not be all that familiar with /.'s 'editorial' habits :\

  5. Re:Symantec Web? AHHHHHHH!!! by bane2571 · · Score: 4, Funny

    I read it like this:
    Semantic web getting real [player]
    and immediately thought "it was bad enough when the original web got it"

  6. Re:Symantec Web? AHHHHHHH!!! by gotzero · · Score: 3, Funny

    "Please note this environment may not be completely safe, so we are going to prevent you from entering. We have also initiated so many system processes that it will simulate a virus on this system."

    The links in that article are neat. I am looking forward to watching the maturity of this!

  7. OpenCalais by lenzg · · Score: 3, Funny

    Finally, Reuters released OpenCalais as free open-source software. OpenDover will appear any time soon. (someone may then connect both using a Channel, SSH perhaps)

  8. Re:Semantic Spam by Necrobruiser · · Score: 5, Funny

    Of course you realize that this will just lead to a bunch of neo-netzis with their anti-semantic remarks....

    --
    "I planned within my means and got a fixed rate mortgage, so where's MY bailout?" -cafepress
  9. Re:Where's the Money? by Simon+(S2) · · Score: 2, Funny

    http://www.google.it/search?q=%22a+website+where+I+can+get+free+kittens+and+other+pets%22

    --
    I just don't trust anything that bleeds for five days and doesn't die.