Say What You Mean: How Semantic Tagging Makes Content More Discoverable, More Useful, and More Valua

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• Say What You Mean How Semantic Tagging Makes
  Content More Discoverable, More Useful, and More
  Valuable
• Stephen Rhind-Tutt, President, May 28, 2008

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Alexander Street Press
Sociology
World Literature
Performing Arts, Drama, and Film
Religion
American Civil War
Social and Cultural History
Womens History
Black Studies
Music
Counseling
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Semantic Indexing
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Traditional Indexing

• Oriented towards secondary materials
• Oriented towards print artifact (book, article,
  journal)
• Some 80 of fields relate to publication
• Flat file
• Abstract and subject fields
• Confusion between primary and secondary materials

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Improving access

• Semantic Indexing
• Tim Berners-Lee and James Hendler in Scientific
  American, May 2001
• an extension of the current web in which
  information is given well-defined meaning,
  better enabling computers and people to work
  in cooperation."
• A quantum shift in the way we look at digital
  objects
• Extracting the science from scientific
  publications
• Extracting the history from history
  publications

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Semantic Indexing Overview
Word
Page
Chapter
Book or Volume
Traditional indexing gt
Semantic indexing gt
Series
Who ?
What ?
Collection
When ?
Where ?
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Traditional vs. Semantic Indexing

• Give me articles from journal xxx prior to 1990
• Give me documents that discuss battles where
  more than 100 people were killed?
• Give me all scenes set before 1850 that portray
  lynching?
• Which authors cite Genesis most frequently?

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The real world
Venue
Director
Production
Author
Theater
Dramatis Personae
Producer
Location
Performance
Play
Lighting
Set Designers
Production Company
Performers
Texts
Ephemera
Production Stills
Criticism
Scenes
Characters
Playbills
Cast List
Acts
Posters
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The virtual world
Resources Play Director Theater Production
Co. Character Scene Etc (45 fields)
Author Birth date Death date Birth Place Death
Place Nationality Occupation Awards (38 fields)
Company Name Productions Performers Etc (14
fields)
Production Director Theater Cast of
Perfs.LightingCostumes Etc (47 fields)
Theater District Location Capacity Style Etc (18
fields)
Characters Plays Age Author Performer Etc (30
fields)
Scenes Where When Setting Subject Etc (41
fields)
Texts KeywordAuthor Date WrittenDate
Published Production (67 fields)
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The virtual world
Resources Play Director Theater Production
Co. Character Scene Etc (45 fields)
Author Birth date Death date Birth Place Death
Place Nationality Occupation Awards (38 fields)
Company Name Productions Performers Etc (14
fields)
Production Director Theater Cast of
Perfs.LightingCostumes Etc (47 fields)
Theater District Location Capacity Style Etc (18
fields)
Texts KeywordAuthor Date WrittenDate
Published Production (67 fields)
Characters Plays Age Author Performer Etc (30
fields)
Scenes Where When Setting Subject Etc (41
fields)
Give me scenes about AIDS written by South
African authors in the past 5 years.
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Early Encounters in North America

• 150,000 pages of materials pertaining to the
  discovery and exploration of North America
• Published in 2001

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Semantic Indexing

• More than a way to answer questions
• A framework by which users can be guided to
  understand, explore, discover and learn.
• A route-map to guide users through data - saving
  time and effort.
• The intellectual fabric by which information
  should be organized
• Delivers answers that cannot be asked elsewhere
• Discipline specific
• Oriented towards the user and the content
• At the right level
• Thoroughly controlled

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Semantic Indexing
Document
Text Author IDEncounter IDSource
IDDateSubject Age writing
Encounter
Source
Author
Account
SourceEditorPublisherPlaceEtc
DayEventEtc
Where ? When ?Who ?DeathsLeaders Etc
Birth ? Death ?Where ?When ?Occupation Etc
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Early Encounters in North America

• Nine controlled vocabularies reveal previously
  inaccessible knowledge
• Compare the English and French relationships
  with the Huron between 1614 and 1616.
• Detail all accounts of flooding on the
  Mississippi before 1750
• Examine the differences in tribal customs 100
  years after first contact
• Examine naming conventions and lists in travel
  narratives
• Give me an image of all North Carolina animals
  that were
• extinct by 1850

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Semantic Indexing
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Semantic Indexing
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Search Functionality
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Tagging
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Counseling Psychotherapy
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Utility of information

• Interactive Tables
• Graph Digitizer
• Equation Plotter
• Diagram Viewer

• Integrated Periodic Table
• Unit Converter
• Slide Show Viewer
• Browsable Tables of Contents

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Social Tagging our experience
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Example Dance in Video
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Playlists
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Playlists
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Playlists
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What works

• Playlists on ASPs music and video products
  gt20,000 users
• Over 120,000 playlists created so far
• 1,000 created by ASP
• 42,000 user created
• 80,000 derivative playlists

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Issues user tagging
Tags
President?
Philadelphia?
Shirts?
Womens Rights?
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Issues granularity
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Summary

• Semantic indexing is essential in the electronic
  world.
• Tagging can help but its not a silver bullet
• More on Tagging
• Session 1D Tag, youre it!
• Tomorrow, 1045 AM to 1215 PM

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