- From: Bijan Parsia <bparsia@cs.man.ac.uk>
- Date: Tue, 10 Jul 2007 16:15:44 +0100
- To: "Bruce D'Arcus" <bdarcus@gmail.com>
- Cc: "Garret Wilson" <garret@globalmentor.com>, semantic-web@w3.org
On 10 Jul 2007, at 15:56, Bruce D'Arcus wrote: > On 7/10/07, Garret Wilson <garret@globalmentor.com> wrote: [snip] >> > Also, I'm curious about if or how people would propose to reconcile >> > the new vCard representation with FOAF; particularly the >> personal name >> > models? >> >> I'd say this is a red herring. First, the FOAF name model is >> notoriously >> ill-defined. There have been issues regarding the FOAF name model >> logged >> for years, with no conclusions. The implementations in the wild are >> inconsistent. The names even have inconsistent syntax. And FOAF is >> dead. >> In May the spec was updated, but little changed besides the version >> number going from 0.1 to 0.9. When I saw new activity, I excitedly >> sent >> a message to the list regarding the vCard names we're working on. >> I got >> no reply, and the list has been inactive since. I don't see the >> value in >> bothering with it. > > I've recently been corrected elsewhere on the casual use of the term > "red herring." The term means a deliberate attempt at obfuscation by > changing the subject. [snip] Not in my idiolect. Garret is using it perfectly correctly. Whether such a reconciliation *is* a red herring is something I don't know :) Plus, there seems to be disagreement in dictionaries as to whether "intent to distract" is critical: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/red%20herring Personally, they way I think of it is that a red herring is the enticing thing that pulls you even against your better judgement. Someone can *use* a red herring deliberately to divert or confound, but I think they occur naturally as well. This discussion is probably just a digression, not a red herring :) Cheers, Bijan.
Received on Tuesday, 10 July 2007 15:14:40 UTC