The fundamental message that I have been trying to get across: (01)
If you want to sell something to somebody (anybody -- IT manager,
computer scientist, philosopher, or whatever), they want to know
what *you* can do for *them*. (02)
If you want to know why it is so difficult to sell the idea of
ontology to IT managers, I suggest that we ask Bill Andersen
a very direct question: (03)
Why did you change the name of OntologyWorks to HighFleet? (04)
I did not ask Bill that question, but my suspicion is that
he wanted to stay in business. Next question: (05)
Why is the word 'ontology' bad for business? (06)
Again, I did not ask Bill. But I suspect that the word 'ontology'
has been hijacked by something called "The Web Ontology Language"
or OWL. Anything that has the word 'ontology' in its name is
likely to be tainted with experiences that people have had
with something called the Semantic Web. (07)
Many people have pointed to niche applications where OWL has
proved to be useful. And many people who work in little companies
that have found a useful niche in selling OWL applications want
to expand their business. I can't complain about that. (08)
But OntologyWorks was a company that actually broke out of that
niche. They did so by a simple strategy: They didn't use OWL.
Instead, they used Prolog and other logic-based tools like XSB. (09)
Furthermore, they applied those tools to mainstream IT systems,
such as relational databases. And they got more business than
they could handle. And their investors wanted them to grow
even further, but they considered the word 'ontology' to be
bad for business. (010)
I may be wrong about my assumptions, and I'd like to ask Bill
for any corrections that might be appropriate. (011)
John (012)
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