Re: [ontology-summit] [Tools][Reuse][Variety][Bottlenecks] Meeting broad

[Amanda Vizedom <amanda.vizedom@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, Jan 31, 2014 at 11:02 AM, Christoph LANGE <math.semantic.web@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

2014-01-31 16:48 Amanda Vizedom:

> If we are going raise such broad questions as "Are ontology languages
> relevant for applications on the Web of (Big) Data?" I hope, very, very
> strongly, that we do not think about them as hypothetical or approach
> them as one might in an academic research context.
>
> Rather, I hope that we turn our attention to the fact that there are,
> *right now*, in the world of web applications, big data, and linked
> data, *many* people and projects making use of ontologies, or at least
> information represented in ontology languages and utilizing some
> features of those languages. Talking about the question of relevance
> theoretically seems to me less important than talking about findings in
> the field, especially for the purposes of cross-field exchange for as
> highlighted in the Summit topic and goals.

Very nicely put.  Indeed I didn't have in mind to start an academic
discussion, so maybe I should have phrased my question as follows:

* What practical problems involving Big Data on the Web can ontology
languages help to solve?

* How can they help to solve them?

Yes! I only add that I think that best way to understand this involves soliciting and listening to what big data and web people who have lots of practical experience, and ontology people who hear and engage with these experience fully. I think we agree, though.

 

Still, with this in mind …

> Yesterday, we heard from Chris Welty, discussing one such well-known
> example in the big data space: Watson. Chris gave some very interesting
> details about what aspects of ontological knowledge are used in Watson
> and how, and which are not used, and why.

… I didn't want to completely rule out the possible answer that, for
certain classes of problems, ontology languages (and research into tools
and techniques around them), might not be the most helpful solution.

Yes, I very much appreciated that! One reason I liked Chris' presentation is that he was very clear and explicit about not only what was helpful, but what wasn't. And he did a nice job of laying out a simplifled version of the complex problem, then saying which aspects of the problem, in his and the Watson team's experience, benefited from ontologies and which areas were such that ontological approaches were not useful.   

Amanda

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