To RDF or not to RDF

existing thread, and also for probably saying things other folks have
already brought up]

I have worked on RDF and systems using RDF for over 15 years now (and on
RDF's "non-Web" predecessors before that). The most important thing I have
learned is that while it is possible to do Linked Data and Semantic Web
stuff *without* RDF, whatever alternative technology you choose, you soon
feel compelled to add features that make it look like RDF. I particularly
see this whenever someone comes to me advocating the use of JSON. RDF is
what it is for a reason, *not* because we arbitrarily threw something
together.

So it is not that RDF "looks bad" or whatever people might be saying. It
is that other technologies and approaches "fall short" of what Linked Data
and Semantic Web really need. Let's not please reinvent things or shove a
round peg in a square hole just because someone prefers curly braces over
angle brackets. Issues like that are not interesting (at all), and we have
more important things to do.

Regards,

	- Ora

-- 
Dr. Ora Lassila  ora.lassila@nokia.com  http://www.lassila.org
Principal Technologist, Nokia

Received on Saturday, 22 June 2013 01:43:27 UTC