Executive Summary"As governments around the world continue to change the way they think about their information systems, away from isolated systems, none of which can talk to each other, and towards more advanced systems based on the Semantic Web, designed to make it easier for citizens, and the government itself, to join these systems together to build new applications that the designers of the original systems may never have thought of.
For example, on the 19th of January, the British Government formally launched
http://data.gov.uk/ , a Semantic Web based site developed under the guidance of Sir Tim Berners-Lee. Compared to systems like this, initiatives like the US
http://data.gov/ which merely points to unconnected piles of data,
look ever more dated.
To build these integrated systems, America needs a trained corps of people trained to deal with semantics. Already this lack of trained personnel is causing serious problems for linking vital Intelligence Community systems, with dangerous effects on National Security . If we don't take action to train the people we need, the situation will only get worse."