So it begins…

http://www.ysearchblog.com/archives/000527.html

With the announcement that Yahoo is to support microformats, the semantic web (if not the Semantic Web) enters the mainstream. RDF still doesn’t have a killer app, but the ability to extract context from metadata is with us now. The sector can begin to see where it can use/advance these standards for its content. Perhaps hList is a start.

Tallinn SWTT conference day one

Above – Eero Hyvonen

By the end of day one, participants at Intelligent Access to Digital Heritage here in Tallinn had listened to a lot of technical info, looked at website pages and heard of high semantic concepts. Sounds a bit dry, but actually there was inspiration around every corner.

For me, one of the highlights of the day was the afternoon session – dominated by Finnish excellence, finished off with an exciting glance at the work of HUMlab from Umea University in Sweden.

Professor Eero Hyvonen From Helsinki University introduced a succession of impressive projects, and also impressive research students, who gave us some insights into the leading work being carried out right now in Finland.

Big news for me was the way the Finns have organised and sorted an approach to ontologies across their sectoral borders, from museums to galleries, from the humanities to other academic and informational spheres.

KultureSampo, soon to be launched in Finland, looks like it could be one of the most joined up cultural portals in Europe, as a result of the way the site sits within a more semantically linked-up cultural society.

More about CultureSampo here

JP

Tallinn SW conference – check the website

Have a look at the conference website – it’s here.

Tallinn pictures now appearing in the SWTT Flickr stream

Tallinn pictures are now beginning to be imported into the SWTT Flickr stream. There’ll be more after the break for lunch, then more at the end of day one.

These are speaker pictures and general audience shots. If you see a picture you’d like to use for any reason, they are copyright free for not-for-profit use, as long as you pop in a copyright SWTT text tag.

If there’s a picture identifying you that you’d like removing, for any reason, I’m happy to do that, just email me at editor@24hourmuseum.org.uk

Jon

Getting comments on this site from Tallinn

If you’re at the Tallinn conference and you haven’t got a WordPress account password, just email me directly and I’ll put your comment online myself.

Email me at editor@24hourmuseum.org.uk

Jon Pratty

Competition at European level?

Toomas Schvak was asked about proliferating web initiatives at Eu level, some of them funded by the same organisation.

The EDL should not just be a portal of db’s but a portal of portals, and it should be outward looking – to other types of publishers like Google or the big online publishers.

Welcome to delegates in Tallinn!

SWTT core group member Jon Pratty is at Intelligent Access to Digital Heritage at Tallinn, Estonia, from Oct 17/18.

Brief remarks will pop up here as the conference progresses – including some pictures in the Flickr box on the right.

If you’re at the conference, feel free to comment on sessions and concepts coming up at the meeting. Your comments will go live once the moderator has approved them, but it should be a quick process.

Good luck!

London meeting notes now online

Notes from the SWTT workshop organised by Frances Lloyd Baynes and Suzanne Keene at the V&A are now online in our Workshops section.

Also have a look in the Flickr group for pics from the day.

Learning objects – background historical notes

SWTT participant Dr Andy Sawyer from Simulacra Media sent these background notes about the background and history of Learning Objects. The work was prepared before last year’s Newcastle SWTT meeting.

If you have anything to add to the notes please do comment and we’ll add your content.

Andy Sawyer’s further notes about Learning Objects

An interview with Tim BL

http://www.technologyreview.com/video/semantic