Martin, (01)
We can all agree on two fundamental principles: (02)
1. The idea of unique identifiers is important. (03)
2. Providing an automatic method for automatically linking
those identifiers to official definitions is also important. (04)
But of these two principles, the first is primary, and the
second is a convenience, which could be satisfied in many
different ways. The ISO method, for example, is based on
printed documents: The unique identifier of the document
together with the unique name within the document is the
method of resolution. For convenience, the resolution of
identifiers to definitions could be automated, but the
printed documents are the official standards. (05)
Kevin's pointer to Tim B-L's note is significant: (06)
http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/LinkedData.html (07)
That note is dated 2006-07-27, last change: $Date: 2009/06/18 18:24:33 $
That implies that the note is recent, and it changes often. (08)
In that note, Tim says (09)
> I'll refer to the steps above as rules, but they are expectations
> of behavior. Breaking them does not destroy anything, but misses
> an opportunity to make data interconnected. This in turn limits
> the ways it can later be reused in unexpected ways. It is the
> unexpected re-use of information which is the value added by the
> web. (010)
That paragraph that considers those rules as "expectations of
behavior" raises all kinds of red flags. Whose expectations?
And whose behavior? Well meaning, but careless programmers?
Mischievous hackers? Organized terrorists? (011)
Two centuries ago, the standards for units of measurement were
considered so precious that they were based on platinum exemplars
kept in sealed vaults in Paris. They were only taken out on rare
occasions to compare them with other exemplars. For portability,
the meter was later redefined in terms of a wavelength of light. (012)
But to replace such official standards with documents that could
be modified by a careless mistake or a mischievous hacker is
the height of folly. (013)
Unless and until URIs are replaced by or implemented by some
provably secure mechanisms, I recommend that official standards
for identifying ontologies and their contents be based methods
similar to the tried and tested ISO procedures -- not on a
mechanism as insecure as the W3C URIs. (014)
John Sowa (015)
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