Tag Archives: semantics

Semantic Search – Call for Papers for Special Issue on Semantic Search for Aslib Journal

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Estimated reading time 4–6 minutes

This special issue aims to explore the possibilities and limitations of Semantic Search. We are particularly interested in papers that place carefully conducted studies into the wider framework of current Semantic Search research in the broader context of Linked Open Data.

Research into Semantic Search and its applications has been gaining momentum over the last few years, with an increasing number of studies on general principles, proof of concept and prototypical applications. The market for Semantic Search applications and its role within the general development of (internet) technologies and its impact on different areas of private and public life have attracted attention. Simultaneously, many publicly funded projects in the field of cultural heritage were initialised. Researchers in many disciplines have been making progress in the establishment of both theories and methods for Semantic Search. However, there still is a lack of comparison across individual studies as well as a need for standardisation regarding the dissociation of Semantic Search of other search solutions, agreed upon definitions as well as technologies and interfaces.

Semantic Search research is often based on large and rich data sets and a combination of techniques ranging from statistical bag of words approaches and natural-language-processing enriched via a subtle utilisation of metadata over classificatory approaches right up to ontological reasoning. Over the last 10 years a lot of initial technical and conceptual obstacles in the field of Semantic Search have been overcome. After the initial euphoria for Semantic Search that resulted in a technically driven supply of search solutions, appraisal of successful and less successful approaches is needed. Amongst other things the limitations of working with open world solutions on – only apparently comprehensive – linked open data sets compared to small domain specific solutions need to be determined.
One ongoing challenge for semantic search solutions is their usability and user acceptance, as only highly usable walk-up-and-use-approaches stand a chance in the field of general search.

For this special issue, we invite articles which address the opportunities and challenges of Semantic Search from theoretical and practical, conceptual and empirical perspectives.

Topics of interest include but are not restricted to:

  • The history of semantic search – how the latest techniques and technologies have come out of developments over the last 5, 10, 20, 100, 2000… years
  • Technical approaches to semantic search : linguistic/NLP, probabilistic, artificial intelligence, conceptual/ontological …
  • Current trends in Semantic Search
  • Best practice – how far along the road from ‘early adopters’ to ‘mainstream users’ has semantic search gone so far?
  • Semantic Search and cultural heritage
  • Usability and user experience of Semantic Search
  • Visualisation and Semantic Search
  • Quality criteria for Semantic Search
  • Impact of norms and standardisation for instance (like ISO 25964 “Thesauri for information retrieval“) and the potential of Semantic Search?
  • How are semantic technologies fostering a need for cross-industry collaboration and standardisation?
  • How are Semantic Search techniques and technologies being used in practice?
  • Practical problems in brokering consensus and agreement – defining concepts, terms and classes, etc.
  • Curation and management of ontologies
  • Differences between web-scale, enterprise scale, and collection-specific scale techniques
  • Evaluation of Semantic Search solutions
  • Comparison of data collection approaches
  • User behaviour and the evolution of norms and conventions
  • Information behaviour and information literacy
  • User surveys
  • Usage scenarios and case studies

Submissions

Papers should clearly connect their studies to the wider body of Semantic Search scholarship, and spell out the implications of their findings for future research. In general, only research-based submissions including case studies and best practice will be considered. Viewpoints, literature reviews or general reviews are generally not acceptable.

Papers should be 4,000 to 6,000 words in length (including references). Citations and references should be in our journal style.

Please see the author guidelines at http://www.emeraldinsight.com/products/journals/author_guidelines.htm?id=ap for more details and submission instructions.
Submissions to Aslib Proceedings are made using ScholarOne Manuscripts, the online submission and peer review system. Registration and access is available at http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/ap.

Important Dates

Paper submission: 15.12.2013
Notice of review results: 15.02.2013
Revisions due: 31.03.2014
Publication: Aslib Proceedings, issue 5, 2014.

About the Journal

Aslib Proceedings (ISSN: 0001-253X) is a peer-reviewed high-quality journal covering international research and practice in library and information science, and information management. The journal is the major publication for ASLIB – the Association for Information Management in the United Kingdom – a membership association for people who manage information and knowledge in organisations and the information industry.
Information about the journal can be found at
http://www.emeraldinsight.com/products/journals/journals.htm?id=ap

Contact the guest editors

Prof. Dr. Ulrike Spree
– Hamburg University of Applied Sciences –
Faculty Design, Medien and Information
Department Information
Finkenau 35
20081 Hamburg
Phone: +49/40/42875/3607
Email: ulrike.spree@haw-hamburg.de

Fran Alexander
Information Architect, BCA Research (2013- )
Taxonomy Manager, BBC Information and Archives (2009-13)
Email: fran@vocabcontrol.com
Twitter: @frangle

Can you use statistics to find meaning?

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Estimated reading time 2–2 minutes

I enjoyed this article in New Scientist about using statistical analysis on the Voynich manuscript to try to work out whether it is a meaningful but secret code or just gibberish.

Ultimately, I remain puzzled as to what the statistics actually tell us. They identify patterns, but meaning is more than simply patterns. However, the fact that certain sets of symbols in the Voynich text appear to cluster in sections with common illustrations suggests it is code. The counter-argument that you could deliberately fake such clustering by mechanical means is intriguing. Without far larger samples, and an understanding of random clusterings, I have no idea whether this sort of faking would produce the same patterns as natural language. I am sure clusters must appear all over the place, without bearing any meaning whatsoever.

I also thought it was interesting that one of the arguments in favour of gibberish was that there were no mistakes. It strikes me there could be many reasons for the lack of proofing and correction and I would want to know more about the rate of correction in similar works before I could assess that argument. I know that standardization of spelling came relatively late, presumably before then far more “mistakes” would have been tolerated.

Nevertheless, a fascinating mystery and one that perhaps cannot be resolved by analysis but by coincidental discovery of the key (if it exists!) – if it is gibberish, perhaps we will never know. Either way, I am sure it would have amused the author to know that their work would still be a controversial topic hundreds of years after it was written!

ISKO UK 2013 – provisional programme

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Estimated reading time 2–2 minutes

I will probably be on the other side of the Atlantic when the ISKO UK conference takes place in July in London, UK. I will be sorry to miss it, because the committee have brought together a diverse, topical, and fascinating collection of speakers.

ISKO UK excels in unifying academic and practitioner communities, and the conference promises to investigate the barriers that separate research from practice and to seek out boundary objects that can bring the communities together.

This is demonstrated in person by the keynote speakers Patrick Lambe of Straits Knowledge and Martin White of Intranet Focus Ltd – both respected for their commercial as well as academic contributions to the field of Knowledge Organization.

Amidst what is already shaping up to be a very full and varied programme, the presentations by Jeremy Tarling and Matt Shearer (BBC News) and Jarred McGinnis and Helen Lippell (Press Association) will show how research in semantic techniques is now being put to practical use in managing the fast-flowing oceans of information that news organizations handle.

The programme also includes a whole session on combining ontologies with other tools, as well as papers on facet analysis and construction of controlled vocabularies. There’s even some epistemology to please pure theoreticians.

Data Ghosts in the Facebook Machine by Fantasticlife

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Understanding how data mining works is going to become increasingly important. There is a huge gap in popular and even professional knowledge about what organisations can now do “under the surface” with our data. For a very clear and straightforward explanation of how social graphs work and why we should be paying attention read Data Ghosts in the Facebook Machine.