Chris Blackwell’s Domain

Web 3.0 and the semantic web have taken some big steps forward as of late. Last week Yahoo! announced that they will be opening up their Open Search platform to allow third parties semantic information to be placed in the search results for a relevant query.

What is the semantic web?

For those who don’t know, the semantic web is the ability to label data according to a set of standard tags for categorization and reference. For example; a contact page usually has some standard information posted on it including phone numbers, email accounts, IM contacts, etc. However, there is no way for a search engine or computer to discern information. Any modern day search engine can read the numbers, the email addresses, the IM addresses but would not be able to asses which number is associated with which person or department.

Using the semantic web, information can be easily tagged including phone and fax numbers and ay other important information readily available to the user. This information is now labelled and accessible to a search engine for usage. If a user searched for ABC Company, the search engine would be able to list ABC Company’s address, phone number, hours of operation and email addresses, all on the search engine results page.

I am really looking forward to the semantic web and what it will bring to a user’s experience of a website or web application. The semantic web will allow users to aggregate data into a clean, and readable format. They will not be bombarded with useless information any longer while trying to find a very specific subject. I predict we will see the semantic web take some big steps forward this year, but I expect it’s break-out will happen in 2009.