RE : [ISSUE-77] [ISSUE-48] Re: [Dbpedia-discussion] Skos subject properties are deprecated

Hi Jakob,

I'm sorry but I don't fully understand your objections: what I call "categorization"(or whatever the proper name be) in wikipedia is indeed linked to an application, the one that will return a set of documents that are relevant for the "history of the internet" each time I browse this category. And the success of this application is dependent on the way the link between documents and categories are related. 

I agree that the relation we are searching for connects a concept to a resource, but I think it should have more semantics: otherwise you could use it to represent a link between one concept and the resource standing for its creator, who might have very little to do with this subject the concept resource stands for. And I do think we can refer to a class of document description and/or retrieval applications that share enough commonalities to give a precise (or inprecise) enough idea of what these semantics are.

Of course I'm sorry if I've misunderstood what you wrote,

Antoine

-------- Message d'origine--------
De: public-esw-thes-request@w3.org de la part de Jakob Voss
Date: ven. 25/01/2008 13:51
À: public-esw-thes@w3.org; dbpedia-discussion@lists.sourceforge.net
Objet : Re: [ISSUE-77] [ISSUE-48] Re: [Dbpedia-discussion] Skos subject properties  are deprecated
 

Antoine wrote:

 > Cheers, (and thank you all of all for this very interesting discussion
 > on an important issue for SKOS. For the moment no formal decision has
 > been taken whether to deprecate skos:subject and to "replace" it by
 > dc:subject, so any input is welcome)

The discussion is interesting and irrelevant in the same way.

> Actually in your wikipedia case there might be a problem anyway. I would 
> not say that it is the TimBL resource which is about the history of the 
> net, but its description on wikipedia: what if this description had been 
> purely biological (size, hair color, preferred beer)? In this case the 
> categorization of the resource you describe under "history of the 
> internet" would be problematic, wouldn't it?

Neither SKOS in general nor the Wikipedia category system is about 
"categorization". There is no general wrong or right in subject 
indexing, it always depends on the concrete application. You can argue 
and discuss endlessly about a the concrete indexing in Wikipedia or any 
other application - but that's not our business! SKOS is not a concrete 
knowledge organization scheme (KOS), but a vocabulary to encode any 
simple (!) KOS.

Richard wrote:

 > I feel that "A skos:subject B" carries a certain implication, in
 > natural language, that "A is about B". I would prefer having another
 > property that does not carry that implication.
 >
 > "A skos:indexedIn B" --
 > "TimBL is indexed under the concept History of the Net".

Ontologies are not about feeling. If the term "subject" has a special 
connotation then how about calling the relation "smirgel" or "kstfxy"? 
Because that's what an RDF relation looks like to a Computer. There is 
no inherent semantic in a relation but its usage - the usage of 
skos:subject is to connect skos:Concept and any other resource. That's 
all. There is no "aboutness" in RDF (unless you define it).

Mikael wrote:

 > I think there might be a point in having a generic property attaching
 > a resource to a Concept, but it has to be as general as
 > "associatedWith".

Name it "subject", "associatedWith", or "indexedIn" - the point is to 
have a relation to connect skos:Concepts with other resources. 
Everything more that that is not simple anymore so it should not be part 
of SKOS.

Greetings,
Jakob


-- 
Jakob Voß <jakob.voss@gbv.de>, skype: nichtich
Verbundzentrale des GBV (VZG) / Common Library Network
Platz der Goettinger Sieben 1, 37073 Göttingen, Germany
+49 (0)551 39-10242, http://www.gbv.de