I re-read the article wrote by Tim O’reilly about: What is the Web 2.0? If this is the Web 2.0, then, what is the Semantic Web? The article talk about:

1. The Web As Platform
2. Harnessing Collective Intelligence
3. Data is the Next Intel Inside
4. End of the Software Release Cycle
5. Lightweight Programming Models
6. Rich User Experiences

Tim talks about the importance of the data in the Web 2.0. The question he asks is: Who owns the data? It is a legitimate question, but is that really a question of the Web 2.0? Possibly, but the thing is that it is already a question of the Web 1.0.

Personally, I would ask the question: How to present that information? In the recent articles and blog posts I read about the Web 2.0, people talk about the openness of data available through hundred different APIs. It is certainly a good practice to gather the right information: much better than scrapping the HTML content of web sites. However, I do not think that this is the best way, a good way for sure, but not the best.

Why people do not talk about the semantic web: a way to present information in such a way that it is partially, even fully, processable by computers? This is even more powerful than hundred different APIs, no? Why is it much more powerful? Because these same applications could talk together without caring about the APIs’ protocols. I think that we should talk about the semantic web concepts much more than APIs when we talk about the place of the Data into the Web 2.0.

If I am wrong, then what is the Semantic Web?