A Curmudgeon's View of the Semantic Web

website@infoadvisors.com — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 14:28:13 GMT

Glenn McDonald of www.furia.com has authored a cranky blog post about the terminology an approaches associated with "THE SEMANTIC WEB" (read that with a lot of echo effect).

1. "Semantic". By starting the name this way, you have essentially, avoidably, uselessly doomed the whole named enterprise before it starts. Most people don't have the slightest idea what this word even means, most of the people who do have an idea think it implies pointless distinctions, and everybody left after you eliminate those two groups will still have to argue about what "semantic" means. This is a rare actual example of begging the question. Or to put it in terms you will understand: congratulations, you've introduced terminological head recursion. Any wonder the program never gets around to doing anything?

He has some good points here. I'm not sure that the semantic world is so doomed as McDonald makes it, but his post is an interesting read. I especially enjoyed the dig at data modelers as well as the use of the term "semantic", since I have also seen many eyes roll at its mere mention. I also get a good chuckle out of hearing someone say to me "it's just semantics" when we are trying to nail down a business requirement related to order status or customer type....to which I usually reply, "Yes, it is".

Karen Lopez: Musings on Data, Process, and Architecture

A Curmudgeon's View of the Semantic Web