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Linked Open Data & Metadata

  • Carlo Meghini
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Handbook of Digital Public History
This chapter is in the book Handbook of Digital Public History

Abstract

This article considers linked data, starting with the four rules drawn up in 2006 by the inventor of the web, Tim Berners-Lee, to produce this kind of data: (1) to use a web standard, the Internationalized Resource Identifier (IRI), to name things within the data; and, in particular, (2) to use IRIs of the HTTP protocol, so that data associated with these IRIs can be retrieved and accessed in exactly the same way that web pages are retrieved and accessed; (3) to use a second web standard, the Resource Description Framework (RDF), to format the data, and a third web standard, the SPARQL Query Language, to query those data. Finally, (4) to use IRIs from other datasets within the data, so as to connect one’s own data with those of other people. This article comments on these rules and discusses their implications, highlighting in particular the fact that they lay the bases for the creation of the Semantic Web, that is, a new web, parallel to the web for humans as we have known it for the last two decades. The Semantic Web is made up of pages containing formal knowledge expressed as linked data. This knowledge is consumed by artificial agents carrying out trivial, time-consuming, and error-prone tasks (such as counting the occurrences of a certain syntactic construct in Dante’s Comedia), freeing humans from such tasks and letting them use their time for more intellectual activities (such as figuring out the evolution of Dante’s culture). The vision of the Semantic Web is presented along with two basic ingredients for its establishment: the Resource Description Framework (RDF), the language for expressing linked data, and ontologies - that is, vocabularies - that axiomatize the definitions of the terms used in linked data. For the realization of the Semantic Web, RDF is necessary but not sufficient, because RDF provides the mere structure of linked data, without indicating any particular way to represent a specific domain. This is the role of ontologies, without which any linked data dataset would remain confined within a (possibly very small) community, defeating the vision of a common, global data space. Finally, the article discusses the role of the Semantic Web for the scholarly domain. In fact, linked open data and ontologies play a very important role in the scientific and scholarly world by offering tools for the creation and sharing of data and vocabularies. The key concept here is interdisciplinarity. It has been long recognized that significant progress can be achieved in all branches of science in research projects that are able to combine tools, data, and knowledge from different domains. Research infrastructures such as D4Science are complex systems that allow users to realize interdisciplinarity in science by offering scientists virtual research environments where they can find the tools, data, and knowledge that they need for their work. They also provide them with the communication and collaboration facilities that are necessary to cooperate with their colleagues. D4Sceince is also supporting the humanities with virtual research environments like those of the PARTHENOS and ARIADNE infrastructural projects.

Abstract

This article considers linked data, starting with the four rules drawn up in 2006 by the inventor of the web, Tim Berners-Lee, to produce this kind of data: (1) to use a web standard, the Internationalized Resource Identifier (IRI), to name things within the data; and, in particular, (2) to use IRIs of the HTTP protocol, so that data associated with these IRIs can be retrieved and accessed in exactly the same way that web pages are retrieved and accessed; (3) to use a second web standard, the Resource Description Framework (RDF), to format the data, and a third web standard, the SPARQL Query Language, to query those data. Finally, (4) to use IRIs from other datasets within the data, so as to connect one’s own data with those of other people. This article comments on these rules and discusses their implications, highlighting in particular the fact that they lay the bases for the creation of the Semantic Web, that is, a new web, parallel to the web for humans as we have known it for the last two decades. The Semantic Web is made up of pages containing formal knowledge expressed as linked data. This knowledge is consumed by artificial agents carrying out trivial, time-consuming, and error-prone tasks (such as counting the occurrences of a certain syntactic construct in Dante’s Comedia), freeing humans from such tasks and letting them use their time for more intellectual activities (such as figuring out the evolution of Dante’s culture). The vision of the Semantic Web is presented along with two basic ingredients for its establishment: the Resource Description Framework (RDF), the language for expressing linked data, and ontologies - that is, vocabularies - that axiomatize the definitions of the terms used in linked data. For the realization of the Semantic Web, RDF is necessary but not sufficient, because RDF provides the mere structure of linked data, without indicating any particular way to represent a specific domain. This is the role of ontologies, without which any linked data dataset would remain confined within a (possibly very small) community, defeating the vision of a common, global data space. Finally, the article discusses the role of the Semantic Web for the scholarly domain. In fact, linked open data and ontologies play a very important role in the scientific and scholarly world by offering tools for the creation and sharing of data and vocabularies. The key concept here is interdisciplinarity. It has been long recognized that significant progress can be achieved in all branches of science in research projects that are able to combine tools, data, and knowledge from different domains. Research infrastructures such as D4Science are complex systems that allow users to realize interdisciplinarity in science by offering scientists virtual research environments where they can find the tools, data, and knowledge that they need for their work. They also provide them with the communication and collaboration facilities that are necessary to cooperate with their colleagues. D4Sceince is also supporting the humanities with virtual research environments like those of the PARTHENOS and ARIADNE infrastructural projects.

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter I
  2. Contents V
  3. Introduction 1
  4. Part 1: Historiography
  5. The Historiographical Foundations of Digital Public History 17
  6. Crowdsourcing and User Generated Content: The Raison d’Être of Digital Public History 35
  7. Sharing Authority in Online Collaborative Public History Practices 49
  8. Shifting the Balance of Power: Oral History and Public History in the Digital Era 61
  9. Digital Public Archaeology 77
  10. Identities – a historical look at online memory and identity issues 87
  11. Digital Environmental Humanities 97
  12. Combining Values of Museums and Digital Culture in Digital Public History 107
  13. Open Access: an opportunity to redesign scholarly communication in history 121
  14. Past and Present in Digital Public History 131
  15. Digital Hermeneutics: The Reflexive Turn in Digital Public History? 139
  16. Part 2: Contexts
  17. Archivists as Peers in Digital Public History 149
  18. History Museums: Enhancing Audience Engagement through Digital Technologies 165
  19. Interactive Museum & Exhibitions in Digital Public History Projects and Practices: An Overview and the Unusual Case of M9 Museum 175
  20. Digital Public History in Libraries 185
  21. Publishing Public History in the Digital Age 199
  22. “Learning Public History by doing Public History” 211
  23. Spaces: What’s at Stake in Their Digital Public Histories? 223
  24. Digital Public History in the United States 235
  25. Technology and Historic Preservation: Documentation and Storytelling 243
  26. Social Media: Snapshots in Public History 259
  27. Part 3: Best Practices
  28. Curation: Toward a New Ethic of Digital Public History 277
  29. Data Visualization for History 291
  30. Mapping and Maps in Digital and Public History 301
  31. Gaming and Digital Public History 309
  32. Individuals in the Crowd: Privacy, Online Participatory Curation, and the Public Historian as Private Citizen 317
  33. Building Communities, Reconciling Histories: Can We Make a More Honest History? 327
  34. Cybermemorials: Remembrance and Places of Memory in the Digital Age 337
  35. Living History: Performing the Past 349
  36. Activist Digital Public History 359
  37. Digital Public History: Family History and Genealogy 369
  38. Digital Personal Memories: The Archiving of the Self and Public History 377
  39. Planning with the Public: How to Co-develop Digital Public History Projects? 385
  40. As Seen through Smartphones: An Evolution of Historic Information Embedment 395
  41. Part 4: Technology, Media, Data and Metadata
  42. What does it Meme? Public History in the Internet Memes Era 405
  43. Historical GIS 419
  44. Content Management 431
  45. Linked Open Data & Metadata 439
  46. Big Data and Public History 447
  47. Modeling Data Complexity in Public History and Cultural Heritage 459
  48. History and Video Games 475
  49. Historians as Digital Storytellers: The Digital Shift in Narrative Practices for Public Historians 485
  50. The Audiovisual Dimension & the Digital Turn in Public History Practices 495
  51. Digital Public History and Photography 505
  52. Exploring Large-Scale Digital Archives – Opportunities and Limits to Use Unsupervised Machine Learning for the Extraction of Semantics 517
  53. Infographics and Public History 531
  54. List of Contributors 545
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110430295-039

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter I
  2. Contents V
  3. Introduction 1
  4. Part 1: Historiography
  5. The Historiographical Foundations of Digital Public History 17
  6. Crowdsourcing and User Generated Content: The Raison d’Être of Digital Public History 35
  7. Sharing Authority in Online Collaborative Public History Practices 49
  8. Shifting the Balance of Power: Oral History and Public History in the Digital Era 61
  9. Digital Public Archaeology 77
  10. Identities – a historical look at online memory and identity issues 87
  11. Digital Environmental Humanities 97
  12. Combining Values of Museums and Digital Culture in Digital Public History 107
  13. Open Access: an opportunity to redesign scholarly communication in history 121
  14. Past and Present in Digital Public History 131
  15. Digital Hermeneutics: The Reflexive Turn in Digital Public History? 139
  16. Part 2: Contexts
  17. Archivists as Peers in Digital Public History 149
  18. History Museums: Enhancing Audience Engagement through Digital Technologies 165
  19. Interactive Museum & Exhibitions in Digital Public History Projects and Practices: An Overview and the Unusual Case of M9 Museum 175
  20. Digital Public History in Libraries 185
  21. Publishing Public History in the Digital Age 199
  22. “Learning Public History by doing Public History” 211
  23. Spaces: What’s at Stake in Their Digital Public Histories? 223
  24. Digital Public History in the United States 235
  25. Technology and Historic Preservation: Documentation and Storytelling 243
  26. Social Media: Snapshots in Public History 259
  27. Part 3: Best Practices
  28. Curation: Toward a New Ethic of Digital Public History 277
  29. Data Visualization for History 291
  30. Mapping and Maps in Digital and Public History 301
  31. Gaming and Digital Public History 309
  32. Individuals in the Crowd: Privacy, Online Participatory Curation, and the Public Historian as Private Citizen 317
  33. Building Communities, Reconciling Histories: Can We Make a More Honest History? 327
  34. Cybermemorials: Remembrance and Places of Memory in the Digital Age 337
  35. Living History: Performing the Past 349
  36. Activist Digital Public History 359
  37. Digital Public History: Family History and Genealogy 369
  38. Digital Personal Memories: The Archiving of the Self and Public History 377
  39. Planning with the Public: How to Co-develop Digital Public History Projects? 385
  40. As Seen through Smartphones: An Evolution of Historic Information Embedment 395
  41. Part 4: Technology, Media, Data and Metadata
  42. What does it Meme? Public History in the Internet Memes Era 405
  43. Historical GIS 419
  44. Content Management 431
  45. Linked Open Data & Metadata 439
  46. Big Data and Public History 447
  47. Modeling Data Complexity in Public History and Cultural Heritage 459
  48. History and Video Games 475
  49. Historians as Digital Storytellers: The Digital Shift in Narrative Practices for Public Historians 485
  50. The Audiovisual Dimension & the Digital Turn in Public History Practices 495
  51. Digital Public History and Photography 505
  52. Exploring Large-Scale Digital Archives – Opportunities and Limits to Use Unsupervised Machine Learning for the Extraction of Semantics 517
  53. Infographics and Public History 531
  54. List of Contributors 545
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