Web Services

11 months ago I posted a short entry that posed the question of whether the world needed a metadata extraction service. I stated that the service could quickly become the largest repository of metadata (in the form of named entites and facts) on the Web if it stored the resulting metadata from each request. Open Calais seems to me to be the "metadata extraction service" I had in mind; it's is a Web service that allows you to automatically annotate content and extract information like facts and named entities (people, places, and organizations, and much more) from unstructured text. If that weren't enough of a good thing, Open Calais returns the metadata in RDF.

Although the question of whether we need it still hasn't been answered, I believe this service could be a catalyst for change towards Semantic Web standards if it is integrated into (or used to create plugins for) the multitudes of open source blogs and other CMS software. Open Calais opens the door to the possibility of lowering the barrier enough for everyday users to publish semantic content.

The other day I was thinking, wouldn't it be interesting to see a site come out that essentially acts as a broker or mirror of metadata from other sites? You could go to this site, enter a URL and have the metadata from that page presented to you in clean, crisp XML. It would be even better if this was turned into a Web service and the API was free for anyone to use. I would imagine there would be quite a bit of mashing potential!

Continue reading Does the World Need a Metadata Extraction Service?

A mashup is a hybrid Web application that combines complementary elements from two or more sources to create one integrated experience. Content used in mashups is generally sourced from a third party via an API or from Web feeds (e.g. RSS or Atom). Basically, the point is to take multiple data sources or Web services and turn them into something useful. The idea of combining Web services is not a new one, but it has gained immense traction in recent times and will likely continue to grow in popularity. In this entry I will be discussing both the promising future mashups offer and also potential pitfalls.

Continue reading Mashups: Opportunity, Innovation, and Money