Re: call to arms

May I suggest a very simple solution.
To get the web to be part of every body's life, the key step is to touch people directly. The best way to touch people is by helping them tie up with other people, ie social networking. People are interested in people.People are interested in belonging to social groups, where they can gain advantages by joining. If one has a system whereby one gains advantages by joining, and this advantage can be extended to other people, then one has a viral system. We want people not only to join semantic social networks but for them to perceive the advantage in getting others to join. If those advantages are clear enough, the technology simple enough, then we will gain more and more supporters, who will in turn convert others.
For this the key technology is foaf+ssl. It is reasonably simple to implement too. Take any web site with public profiles, foaf enable it, add a generate WebId 
button, and then allow people to login to that site using foaf+ssl. Make this cr
oss organisational, so that someone who has one WebId can immediately and in one click gain access to another web site. Then make it possible to have simple acc
ess control rules such as allowing friends of friends access to some resources. 
If you do this you will have a viral system.

An example of how easy the user interface should be is 

http://webid.myxwiki.org/

This was a simple Web 2.0 application that can now generate WebId certificates. 
We still need to make it possible to login to that service using foaf+ssl, and t
hat will be my next task. 

This can be a student summer project. They will learn a lot, it will be useful, 
and it will grow our knowledge, and our community.

    Henry

Social Web Architect
http://bblfish.net/

On 29 Mar 2010, at 21:39, Danny Ayers wrote:
> Right now, despite the promise, things seem mired in the mud. People
> aren't seeing the things that the Web of Data has proposed.
> 
> How do we get over this?
>
> Face to face maybe - the bits the interwebs can't provide.
>
> I suggest the leading lights of this sturm sit down in a room
> somewhere in northern Europe, and hammer the damn thing down. It is so
> stupid for it to take so long.
>
> The Internet, and the Web is excellent at providing miraculous stuff,
> but the humans that tie the things together seem to be disappearing
> into different worlds.
> 
> The Semantic Web should be useful by now, by anyone's predictions.
>
>
> something better change
>
> (I'm a scaredy pacifist, so don't take that to heart)
>
> --
> http://danny.ayers.name

Received on Monday, 29 March 2010 21:33:43 UTC