The Topic Maps Attitude

1
The Topic Maps Attitude
Steve Newcomb Emnekart Norge 2006 Oslo, 29 March
2
The Topic Maps Difference (for me, anyway)

• You know how to tell when topic maps are talking
  about the same things.
• You have license to merge topics on that basis.
• Its all about disclosure.

3
Commitments/Disclosures

• Topic maps say what they are talking about.
• Class level Constraints. Universes of
  discourse.
• Instance level Is there a topic, or not? Whats
  known about it?
• Meta-subjects can (but need not) have equal
  privileges.
• Information warranties. (Wow!)
• Subject addresses can be semantic, transparent
  that transparency can be very significant indeed.

4
Perspective is everything

• Knowledge emerges from dialectic tension between
  different perspectives.
• Diversity is strength. Homogeneity is weakness.
• Knowledge sharing involves making perspectives
  contexts explicit.
• A topic map always expresses one or more
  perspectives.

5
Topic maps push? pull? neither? both?

• Transparency and control of transparency.
• Publishing model editorial process.
• Disclosures within disclosures.
• Disclosures above disclosures.
• De-isolation (un-silo-ization) of communities.
  Lifting the curse of Babel.
• Facilitation of collaboration without ontological
  fascism.
• Being ready for unanticipated exploitation
  opportunities.

6
Investing in Topic Maps

• Observations
• Cultures, communities, organizations, and
  individuals either adapt to changing conditions,
  or they die.
• Information is the basis on which human cultures
  and communities adapt to changing conditions.

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Investment Advice

• Be a preferred supplier of one or more classes of
  information essential to the survival of a
  culture, community, organization or individual
  who
• doesnt want to die, and
• has money to spend.
• The preferred supplier will often be the one
  selling the information that is
• easiest to use, and
• most reliable, comprehensive, and exploitable.

8
More investment advice

• Timing is everything.
• Look at todays presentations. Ask yourself
• Shall I try to catch this wave?
• Is it still too early to invest? Can I afford
  the risk of investing too early?
• Can I afford the risk of letting others ride this
  wave without me?
• Can I afford to do the right thing?

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The Topic Maps Attitude

• The ADAPT OR DIE principle, applied globally
• Make a more efficient marketplace of ideas.
• Improve transparency, accountability, trust.
• Delegate ontological authority broadly
  efficiently.
• Make learning and teaching a shared enterprise.
• Disclose context, perspective, and limitations.
• Preserve and respect ambiguity.
• Enable groupthink that transcends syntax.

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The Topic Maps Attitude

• The ADAPT OR DIE principle, applied globally
• Accept the reality that there are many realities,
  
• that all human realities are at best partial and
  incomplete,
• and that they all have value.

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I came here to listen.

• but thank you for listening.
• Now lets learn from some significant investors!