What Would You Build With a Web of Data? - A BETTER WORLD
Georgi asked: What Would You Build With a Web of Data?. Richard McManus found the invitation worthy of a Read Write Web post and thus far it has become home for an interesting discussion.
I agree with several of the proposed ideas and I dislike others. But that's the beauty of this thing, that everyone will come at it from a different angle and, serendipitously along the way, we will run into pieces of each other's construction that fit our own vision. It's the nature of this giant human meshup we call "the web".
Here's my personal favorite app: A Better World.
Recently we had an 8.8 quake down here in Chile and several people died. Almost none if you compare this to Haiti or China. We had roughly 500 casualties. But nevertheless, we should have had zero. None. Zilch.
And this becomes evident when you analyze the causes of each death. Some of them are due to corruption and malpractice in the construction business. The vast majority of them were due to blunt negligence: a tsunami hit several localities after the quake but the alarm system didn't do its thing. In fact, the confused messaging that got across even encouraged some families to stay home while they could have easily walked "by foot", with no hurries, to a safe place.
There are people to be held accountable for all of this. Today, yesterday, 10 years ago, in the future and everywhere around the world. This anecdote is a symptom of a widespread and ancient social pandemic that is very hard to erradicate: negligence, corruption and lack of accountability.
A Web of Data would win in the long run. We should be able to go back and see why the Tsunami alert system was not in good shape and figure out where the missing satellite phones went ( if they were ever bought ).
In fact, the propsect of being implicitly accountable for anything would have enticed the responsible parties to do the job right in the first place. No one wants to go against his own interests. Not even the worse sociopaths. In fact, they would be the first ones to become "extremely good". So, while the deepest cause will remain, we would have effectively turned the tables on the problem.
( one name for this App could be: implicity accountability ).
We would also be able to rebuild the country faster and in a more agile manner if we had the "loose coupled coordination" that is naturally derived from a shared data substrate and a single world view. It is very hard to coordinate people in such a rush and, just like in the enterprise, information fragmentation has become enemy number 1.
And the blessing is that the enterprise understands this problem, and they are willing to pay and work to achieve this, again, in their own interest. Therefore, it is just a matter of time until my favorite app is in place.
Those that have heard my presentations know by heart what I always say: The only scarcity we have to overcome in order to fix the pending issues of our society is the Cost of Information Integration. All the other elements are present:
- Most people already want to help
- Those that don't will find an incentive once the attribution mechanisms are in place, courtesy of the Web of Data ( remember that identity & reputation are the new gold )
- Goods can already be quickly moved across the world in a granular and efficient fashion given that you know the destination
So, my favorite app is definitely "A Better World".
As for the other ideas, they are all steps in this direction and will contribute their bit for my favorite app ;)
The global roadmap is unstoppable!
