ISO standardization

Dear all,

  thanks for all your responses on this matter. I try to summarize all 
the answers and suggest how to proceed forward:

1) Are we going to publish the spec as it is? (Aldo, among others)

Philipp: Yes, that is my understanding. Of course, a process of 
standardization within ISO always allows member states to provide 
feedback and comments on standards as part of the process, and we will 
need to react to them. I do not expect a lot of feedback and comments as 
there is no industrial lobby here. That would be different for ISO 
processes in the delivery chain or in production ;-)

2) Moving to a W3C Recommendation would also be an option (Armando, 
Christian, others)

Philipp: Yes, indeed. We could even go the W3C and ISO route in 
parallel. However, it would be important to synchronize those two 
threads closely in order to make sure that the same standard is 
published twice under different standardization bodies. I will explore that.

3) Some of you are sceptic whether ISO is the right body for us, also in 
terms of effort (Thierry, Christian, Francis, others)

Philipp: Indeed. I have these doubts as well. What is clear is that the 
ISO standard will not be "closed". There will be some closed and 
copyrighted parts, mainly comprising definitions and possibly examples 
of use. The actual description of the ontolex model will continue to be 
open and can be implemented by anyone.

4) Relation to LMF (Thierry, Nancy, Christian, Gil others)

Philipp: Let them come! Now seriously: If we try to synchronize these 
two threads, then the process will be endless (see point 1). So we 
should avoid getting into any serious discussion between these two 
groups/threads IMHO.

5) Possibility of standarizing only the "core" model (Elena and friends 
from UPM)

Philipp: Indeed, this proposal has some charme. In the sense that it 
scopes the whole thing more, there are less details to discuss. Further, 
it gives the model as such the character of a standard. And then 
everyone is free to use the modules or extensions they like.

6) Standards are old-fashioned (Philipp)

Philipp: Indeed, possibly standards are simply old-fashioned. The SW is 
a very bottom-up, grass-roots, base democratic movement with 
vocabularies being proposed and being adopted or not. Ontolex is doing 
good here. So maybe we do not need a standard. Standards are 
old-fashioned. For old-fashioned people that need an official stamp. 
Possibly this is the reason why W3C does not talk about standards but 
only about recommendations. (A bit of self-irony helps me to work under 
severe contradictions and keep on top of things, could not resist, sorry ;-)

In any case, let me summarize the thread:

1) I have heard no strong objections against standardization of the 
model (other than by Philipp ;-). So this seems to be an interesting 
possibility for most of us.
2) I have heard people raising the doubt whether ISO is the right body. 
Some have suggested considering whether we can go an alternative route 
(W3C) or a parallel route (W3C and ISO)
3) Some have raised concerns about openness of the standard: it is a 
"sine qua non" that the standard can be implemented by everyone at no 
cost. That is not negotiable.
4) We should avoid lengthy discussion and iterations.
5) Possibility of publishing only the core. Very interesting.

I propose we proceed as follows:

1) We kick-off the standardization process at ISO and see how it goes. 
We can pull out anytime by not doing anyhting if it turns out to be to 
difficult, too bureaucratic or the conditions are not acceptable.
2) We can investigate in parallel transcending to a W3C Group, with the 
goal of publishing the core model as a first recommendation jointly (or 
not) to an ISO standard. I will need some advise of experienced people 
(Felix?)

I hope that is fine for everyone.

Thanks for all your comments,

Philipp.


-- 
--
Prof. Dr. Philipp Cimiano
AG Semantic Computing
Exzellenzcluster für Cognitive Interaction Technology (CITEC)
Universität Bielefeld

Tel: +49 521 106 12249
Fax: +49 521 106 6560
Mail: cimiano@cit-ec.uni-bielefeld.de

Office CITEC-2.307
Universitätsstr. 21-25
33615 Bielefeld, NRW
Germany

Received on Tuesday, 22 November 2016 08:06:54 UTC