UK Museums and the Semantic Web

万维网改变了人们寻找和利用信息的方式。自从它作为物理学家的协作工具开始以来，它已经成为一个真正的全球信息发布渠道。最近，内容曾经是页面上的被动文本，它正在快速变得动态，灵活和响应用户的需求。其结果是，知识型产业的意义发生了根本性的变化。作为知识经济中的关键部门，学术和文化部门未来的可持续性取决于我们如何有效和直观地使我们掌握的大量全球重要信息具有相关性和可访问性。在当前的网络上，用户不容易确定信息的质量、权威性或价值。互联网是通过无法区分价值的技术来传递的，也无法区分足球比赛结果和量子流体力学等内容，它对所呈现的信息一无所知。今天的网络依赖于像谷歌这样的服务，从文档内容和人类搜索行为中创建搜索结果，这远非理想。然而，Web现在正在经历下一阶段的演变。如果说现有的网络可以比作一本书，里面有一页页的信息，那么未来就在于让这些信息对真正的全球受众变得动态和有意义。这就是语义网的目标。语义网是蒂姆·伯纳斯-李（Tim Berners-Lee）的心血结晶，他是万维网联盟（World Wide Web Consortium，W3C）的创始人，也是南安普顿大学的计算机科学教授。它最好被认为是一套标准和方法，使内容“自我描述”，并创建近似于“理解”该内容的网络。想象一下搜索引擎“理解”你在寻找什么。想象一下，自动化的方法可以将大量不同页面的内容整合在一起，并重新组合它们以创建全新的在线服务。想象一下，让人们通过智能链接逐步构建一段信息的上下文。这些都是语义网的目标。我们拥有大量的权威信息和我们分享的专业知识-在创建，结构和解释这些信息-意味着我们处于一个强大的位置，成为一个更有效的网络的一部分。语义Web的实现可能取决于“元数据”的质量-信息的结构化摘要，以及如何在概念上组织这些元数据以供机器理解。知识所有者需要得到工具来做这件事。其中一些已经到位，比如像“都柏林核心”这样的元数据格式和像“主题图”这样的关系格式，但这些需要理解和仔细开发才能实际使用。这两个部门都在开发语义网的方法，但这些发展在很大程度上是分开的。我们现在所处的阶段是，我们可以了解语义网的学术和技术发展的进展情况，并集中精力研究如何实际开始使用它。因此，现在是发起这些研讨会的时候了。尽管一些关键的利益攸关方（包括联合监委会和工作重点）对这一领域有着浓厚的兴趣，但没有一个单一的论坛供各社区合作。该提案的主要推动力是提供一个独特的环境，将学术界和文化机构的关键人物聚集在一起，为我们参与语义网制定路线图。MLA数字未来主管大卫·道森（David Dawson）表示：“实现语义网的潜力是公共信息环境交付的核心，也是学术和文化部门未来发展的关键因素。现在需要的是一个机会，将主要行为者聚集在一起，确定挑战，

The World Wide Web has changed ways people find and sue information. Since its beginnings as a collaboration tool for physicists, it has become a truly global channel for distributed publication of information. More recently, where once content was passive text on a page, it is fast becoming dynamic, flexible and responsive to the needs of its users. The result is a fundamental change in what it means to be a knowledge-based industry. As key sectors within the knowledge economy, the future sustainability of the academic and cultural sectors is dependant on how effectively and intuitively we make relevant and accessible the vast amounts of globally important information we hold. On the current Web it is not easy for users to determine quality, authority or value of information. The Web is delivered through technology that has no way of distinguishing value, or between content about, for instance, the football results and quantum hydrodynamics.It doesn't 'know' anything about the information it presents in a way that a person can. The Web today relies on services like Google to create search results from document content and human searching behaviour.This is far from ideal. However, the Web is now undergoing the next stage of evolution. If the existing Web can be compared to a book, with its pages of information, the future lies in making this information dynamic and meaningful to a truly global audience. This is the goal of the Semantic Web. The Semantic Web is the brainchild of Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the Web, Director of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and Professor of Computer Science at Southampton University. It is best thought of as a set of standards and approaches to make content 'self - describing' and create networks which approximate an 'understanding' of that content.Imagine search engines 'understanding' what you're looking for. Imagine automated ways of pulling content together from vast numbers of different pages' and reassembling them to create entirely new online services. Imagine enabling people to build incrementally on the context of a piece of information via intelligent links. These are objectives of the Semantic Web.We hold vast amounts of authoritative information and the expertise which we share - in creating, structuring and interpreting that information - mean that we are in a strong position to be part of a more effective Web. Realisation of the Semantic Web might depend the quality of the 'metadata' - structured summaries of information, and how this metadata is organised conceptually for machines to understand. Knowledge owners need to be given tools to do it.Some of this is in place, such as metadata formats like 'Dublin Core' and relationship formats like 'Topic Maps', but these need understanding and careful development for practical use. Both sectors are developing approaches to the Semantic Web, but these developments are happening largely separately. We are now at a stage where we can access progress on the academic, technical development of the Semantic Web and focus on how we can practically begin to use it. It is timely, then, to instigate these workshops.Although a number of key stakeholders (including the JISC and MLA) have a strong interest in this area, there is no single forum through which the communities collaborate. The main impetus for this proposal is to offer a unique environment, bringing together key figures academia and cultural institutions to shape the roadmap for our involvement in the Semantic Web.David Dawson, Head of Digital Future at MLA said: 'Realising the potential of the Semantic Web is central to the delivery of the Common Information Environment, and as such a key factor in the future development of both the academic and culture sectors. What is needed is an opportunity to bring the key players together and identify the challenges and