Umair Haque / Bubblegeneration

Thursday, November 22, 2007

The Social Graph is Not Web 3.0 (But The Graph Might Be)

OK. Even more misconception going on today about the www, almost everyone misinterpreting this post from Tim Berners-Lee.

Tim is saying that there is another layer of abstraction emerging: net --> www --> graph.

A graph is the structure of connections between objects.

Tim is not just talking about social graphs. He's talking about graphs in general.

So let's not conflate his post with claims about social graphs being panaceas for everything under the sun - that's distinctly not what he's saying - if you think he's talking only about Facebook, you're (seriously) missing the point.

There are many kinds of graphs. Social connections are just one way to organize a set of nodes.

-- umair // 9:55 PM // 3 comments

Comments:

Well, he seems to be making an attempt to associate *his* graphs with social graphs.

And brings up FOAF a lot, which is the nearest thing SemWeb has to a success story.

He's 180 degree wrong if he thinks "semantic graphs" are a higher level of abstraction. More semantics is NEVER "higher level of abstraction".

http://blahsploitation.blogspot.com/2007/11/tim-berners-lee-unconsciously-pinpoints.html

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phil jones // 1:42 AM

Get the sense from the previous comment that there is an attempt to play on words with the use of "semantic". Abstraction is *REALLY* key here. Tim is taking a step back (again), and strategists would do well to do the same. It's the content stupid....(because content is structural).

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Chris // 9:32 PM

i agree with the comment from chris above....structured content is needed to allow people to structure the connections between content as they like -- to essentially roll their own web.

more importantly, whoever is the anti-marketer that is coming up with terms like "semantic web" and "social graph," please stop. simple, intuitive terms that people understand will help us having a real conversation. (although admittedly i am at a loss for what those simple, intuitive words might be).

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kid mercury // 12:14 PM