North Atlantic Health Sciences Libraries2009 Meeting
October 26, 2009
Stuart L. Weibel Senior Research Scientist
NAHSL2009
Semantic Web Technologies:Changing Bibliographic
Futures?
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Stuart WeibelSenior Research Scientist
• OCLC Research• Dublin Core• Working in Seattle• Collaboration with UW• NSF DataNet proposal
for curation of scientific
data
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
What’s this I hear about the Semantic Web?
• What is the Semantic Web?
• What does it have to do with bibliography?
• Does it make life better for patrons?
• Does it strengthen libraries?
• Is it practical?
• Where can we get some?
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
What is the Semantic Web?
• An approach to embedding structure in web resources to facilitate the extraction of meaning by machines and people.
• A set of technologies– RDF: Resource Description Framework (a metadata
architecture for the Web)– OWL– SKOS– Linked Data
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Semantic Web Technologies:RDF
• RDF– a syntax for making assertions on the web– A structure to support inference by machines– RDF assertions are always expressed as triples
• An RDF assertion has a subject, a predicate, and and object:
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
RDF Assertions:Subject – Predicate – Object
• This presentation has a title of Semantic Web Technologies: Changing Bibliographic Futures?
• The author of this presentation is Stuart Weibel• This presentation was delivered on 2009-10-26
Presentation
Semantic Web Technologies…
2009-10-26
Stuart Weibel
Title Author
Date of Delivery
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
RDF Assertions
• Encoded in XML on the Web• The nodes (information resources) are URIs• The Arcs (predicates) are also URIs
Presentation
Semantic Web Technologies…
2009-10-26
http://example.org/staffid/12345
http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/title http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/creator
http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/date
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
The only thing you need to know…
• RDF provides a web language for declaring relationships among information resources
• It is a bit like sentence diagramming • The important thing is to identify all the bits with
globally unique, persistent Identifiers (URIs)
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
OWLWeb Ontology Language
• W3C standard for expressing ontology relationships
• Ontologies are important tools for knowledge representation
• The importance of knowledge representation diminishes rapidly as the scope of representation increases
• Still largely undemonstrated general impact
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
SKOSSimple Knowledge
Organization System
• W3C standards designed to support the declaration of controlled vocabularies and classification systems using the idioms of the semantic web (RDF).
• SKOS is simpler than OWL• Less expertise required to deploy structured
terminologies
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Linked DataWhat's all the fuss about?
• The web is all about links: Anything new here?• A web of data versus a web of documents• Partly about granularity of resources
– Addressable assertions as opposed to addressable documents
• Partly about doing inference on the web• Making machines do more of the work of
interpreting data
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Principles of Linked DataTim Berners-Lee
• 1.Use URIs as names for things (identifiers)• 2. Use HTTP URIs so that people can look up
those names• 3.When someone looks up a URI, provide
useful information• 4.Include links to other URIs so that they can
discover more things
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Linked Open Data ProjectSeeding the Web of Data
http://linkeddata.org/
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Linked Data and Bibliography
• Linked Data is a natural approach for bibliographic data:
Why?
Because FRBR provides us with a coherent conceptual map of data about library assets
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
FRBR Entities – Librarianship’s contribution to a richer,
structured (semantic) Web
Group 1 Group 2 Group 3
Work Person Concept
Expression Corporate body
Object
Manifestation Event
Item Place
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
And don’t forget Social Bibliography:
User-Generated Content
Group 1 Group 2 Group 3
Work Person Concept
Expression Corporate body
Object
Manifestation
Event
Item Place• Book Reviews• Lists• Services• Commentary
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Hook everything together with the right sort of identifiers
• A coherent identifier infrastructure is essential to establishing a rich and dynamic scaffolding of interconnected information resources to support “users and uses of bibliographic data”
• Broad dissemination of canonical, globally-scoped public identifiers serves the library collaborative and is the single most compelling means of making library assets visible on the Web
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Some Design Parameters for Identifiers in the
Global Library Community
• Persistence• Universal accessibility• Global scoping• Search Engine
Optimization
• Canonical identification• Branding• Usability• Granularity and the
FRBR model
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Persistence
• Not technological, but rather, a function of the commitment of organizations
• Libraries and other cultural memory organizations do this well
• Harder to do in the digital era, but the community is up to the task
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Universal access and global scoping
• Open to all: public identifiers in a public Web• Should work in Myanmar, Melbourne, and
Minneapolis alike• WorldCat is the first globally-scoped identifier
architecture for library assets in which the global surrogate is mapped to locality
• Holdings data turns out to be critical in supporting the last mile problem
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Search Engine Optimization and Canonical Identifiers
• Visibility of assets in the global library is diluted by the multiplicity of identifiers– Many competing identifier schemes
– Localized versions of identifiers
• Agreement on a canonical identifier – Raises search engine ranking
– Concentrates aggregation of social content
– Simplifies supply-chain processing
– Is Item X the same as…related to… relevant to… Item Y?
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Usability of URIs
• URIs should be designed for people as well as machines
• URIs should be ‘speakable’• URIs should be a short as can be managed• URIs should have a predictable pattern that
makes them ‘hackable’ and ‘truncatable’
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Is Linked Data Good for Libraries?
• Linked data can help users navigate authors, articles, concepts, organizations, and their relationship to other resources on the Web
• Linked data can help fix library assets in the context of other data on the Web
• Linked data can help reduce the barriers between traditional catalogs and the open Web
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Social Networking Software
• It isn’t new… only the technical manifestation is• Library services in emerging social networks • Motivate people to participate
– Tagging– Book Reviews– Emergent relationships, evident from data about what people
buy and borrow, like and dislike (business intelligence)
• Link to the people as well
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Linked Data will help fix library assets in their larger context
• Tags, book reviews, recommendation data is an increasingly important component of bibliography
• Crowd-sourced data need not go in our catalogs
• Reliable, canonical identifiers will help tie together heterogeneous content
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Web is a wonderful metaphor, but perhaps something a bit more durable?
• We want more– Coherence and context– Durable environments that help us preserve
and fix resources in the context of culture– Librarianship embedded in the emerging
technologies of a social, semantic Web– Linked data
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Web or Scaffolding?http://www.smart-kit.com/s291/what-spider-webs-can-teach-us-about-caffeines-effect-on-the-brain/
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Is Linked Data Practical?
• Libraries know better than most the importance of managing quality and establishing authority
• It is unclear what the best formats for exposing linked data to the open web might be
• The spirit of the Web suggests trying things and changing them as appropriate.
• Watch Hans Rosling’s Ted Talk for an example of how linked data can shine
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
The future of Library catalogs?
• Evolving towards the network level• Collections linked to people, organizations, global
locations, concepts, context, metadata, and social networking benefits
• Fit into the workflow and social lives of patrons• Help create a scaffolding for past knowledge and
future productivity
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
An Example of Linked Data in Action
• Hans Rosling’s tour de force of linked data on the Web
• http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_shows_the_best_stats_you_ve_ever_seen.html
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Some Early Efforts
• Libris: Catalog of the National Library of Sweden designed from a linked data perspective
• Library of Congress Authorities: http://ld.loc.gov – LCSH
• Dewey.info is a web site that presents the Dewey Summaries as Linked Data.
NAHSL2009
Stuart Weibel
Thanks for your attention!
• Find me on
weibel-lines.typepad.com
