The growth of blogs on the Web has had quite a lot of implications. Users are seeing many changes in the way they “browse”. Browsers(Mozilla), Search Engines( Feedster, Technorati) are changing the way users look for information on the web.
First point from the user perspective:
1. Will blogs make the term “browse” obsolete ? Are we headed towards coining a new term for the way we interact and use the web? If yes, what do you think might describe this new paradigm shift?

The second point as seen from our(research) perspective:
1. What changes in traditional IR will the World Live Web require ? When the % of blogs on the Web increase what changes in crawling and indexing algorithms are necessitated. Will the current mechanisms used by blog search engines scale ?
2. How would search algorithms deal with redundancy of information. In many cases quoting other blogs is quite common in the blog world.
3. What structure/semantics to information is required ? One of the reasons for the popularity of blogs is RSS – no doubt. Is RSS in the current form sufficient for managing information on the World Live Web ? To what extent is Semantic Blogging useful?

More to follow …

Feedster is a search engine that indexes RSS feeds from “mainstream information providers” and weblogs. It indexes over 1 million syndicated sources and adds approximately 5,000 new feeds daily. This includes over 50,000 professionally published sources such as the NYT, BBC, CNET, IDG, and Wired. In addition to ad hoc searches, customized information is aggregated and delivered frequently to users in a unified interface. A web-based news aggregator, MyFeedster, email alerts and custom feed creation deliver the information.

Jorge Luis Borges described an interesting ontology for animals attributed to the Chinese encyclopaedia Celestial Empire of Benevolent Knowledge. This appeared in the essay ‘The Analytical Language of John Wilkins’ in Other Inquisitions, 1937-1952, (1964).

pOWL is an open source semantic web development plattform implemented in PHP. pOWL is designed for the “collaborative, distributed development of ontologies”, motivating the choice of PHP”

“Since PHP is by far the most distributed web development technology (as regularly confirmed by Netcraft), the semantic web paradigm will probably only be successful in a broad perspective if there are applications and tools available tightly interacting with this language. The aim of the pOWL project is thus to deliver a PHP and web-based ontology edititing and management solution to the OpenSoure community.”

IMHO the most important word in ‘semantic web’ is the second one, so it makes sense that tools that are tightly integtrated into the web may well be required for the success of the semantic web.

Harry about to defend his Ph.D. Dissertation Getting wings?

Do you think you know what ideas are going to be hot? Do you want to make money on your unique skill, even if it’s only virtual? Media Mammon is a market of news, memes and hypes in which you trade shares of words and phrases representing companies, countries, events, persons or technologies. A share’s value is determined by the frequency that the associated phrase appears in international media during the previous day. You can participate by creating an account and receiving an initial $250 with which to trade. You can also create new shares with any word or phrase that will remain active for at least a week. Our recommendation? ‘semantic web’ is a strong buy and hold.

“Camera phones will soon have lenses made from nothing more substantial that a couple of drops of oil and water, but will still be capable of auto focusing, and even zooming in on subjects.”

This story was first reported at /.

It’s amazing that this thing actually works. The company expects products to be on the shelves by Q1 2006. For some reason, I feel the pace of technology advancement is getting faster everyday.

The article Truth, lies differ in brain scans is from CNN

“WASHINGTON (Reuters) — Brain scans show that the brains of people who are lying look very different from those of people who are telling the truth, U.S. researchers said on Monday.”

Accurate lie-detection offers concrete judgment of honest, which then helps us establish trust.
The success by brain scan is partial based on that it is hard for lier to control the brain activity. The other well-known lie-detection signals, such as gesture, voice, heart rate are much easy to observe but also easy to be pretended. I’m look forward to see more concrete proof of such discovery.

As reported by BusinessWire

“W3C10″ Program Looks Back, Looks Forward

To celebrate its tenth anniversary, W3C is organizing a one-day symposium on 1 December for its Members and invited guests to reflect on the impact of the Web, W3C’s central role in its growth, and risks and opportunities facing the Web during W3C’s second decade.

The “10″ and “15″ came through very well here.

In March of 1989 while employed at CERN (l’Organisation Europeenne pour la Recherche Nucleaire), Tim Berners-Lee wrote a proposal that would become the basis for the World Wide Web. With approval from his supervisor, the late Mike Sendall, and support from colleagues including Robert Cailliau, Berners-Lee’s invention grew from one server at CERN (1990), to millions and millions of servers today.
In October 1994, Berners-Lee, with help from the late Michael Dertouzos of the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science, founded the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Its earliest stated mission was to “Lead the Web to Its Full Potential.”