I had a unique opportunity to attend a presentation put on by The New York Semantic Web Meetup called Content, Identifiers and Freebase from Metaweb about ways to use Freebase. I’ll use organizer Marco Newmann’s words to describe Freebase:

“Freebase is a community managed database for knowledge about the world. Information in Freebase is organized as a web of facts, which can be systematically retrieved.”

So get this: Someone else stores and maintains the data, and you get to use it. This is a great resource for building applications or as a repository to supplement content projects.

As I had covered back in June, I am itching to build something using these resources, and last night may have given me a little more inspiration. For help I’ll look to pick up Jaime Taylor’s new book “Programming the Semantic Web“. Jaime Taylor presented a mix of high-level application ideas along with some code samples to show how it works, both the ease and flexibility of accessing data. Robert Cook, the co-founder of Metaweb Technologies, covered aspects about how we can use the Freebase database, including usage allowances (100k queries/day), the Creative Commons licensing requirements, and how we can upload and maintain Freebase data

I can already think of a great semantic search application that can be built with already available data — so if you are that client I spoke to last week — call me fast this is a home run, or I’m building it myself!

Like I said: It makes you want to start building. Great presentation.

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Last night I attended a panel discussion on The Future of Hyperlocal City Guides that was part of the Future of Local Media Salon Series.

The panel participants had a opportunity to discuss their company and products, and also voice some opinions. The panelists were: James Tunik the CEO of Mapcidy; Dennis Crowley the Co-Founder of hot start-up Foursquare; Polly Lieberman, VP at Buzzd; and Brad Rosen the Founder of Prximity.

However this is where I thought there might have been a disconnect between the topic and the panel — I do not really see these companies as being hyperlocal. Sure they are local-based guides, and each offer their own ways to gather and display information about where you are right now, but they do not present the hyper-local qualities of our two NY entries, outside.in or Patch.

With that behind me, I have to say that Mapcidy may be the closest to a hyperlocal implementation based on Tunik’s description of the planned launch on September 10. The plan is to gather data as it is published and build a layer on top of a Google Maps API. Foursquare seems to be the most fun, and likely the best chance to deliver the ad dollars that are missing from this business. The issue there appears to be scalability, though to be fair this has always been an issue with rolling out local sites. Buzzd seems to be approaching this more from the mobile web side, which is in-line with Lieberman’s comment that the mobile apps business is nothing but a phase the mobile industry is going through. She thought that apps go back to the days that applications where distributed on CD-ROM and ran as a standalone executable. Soon enough the apps will be standardized to run using a mobile browser. In the words of Rosen, Prximity is looking to be our virtual concierge with the ability match events to our interests, location and free time. It’s certainly very early in their development, so let’s give them a chance to evolve, but you can test their beta.

The next step is to sign up for these applications and see how each delivers. I’ll follow-up down the road after I get some testing under my belt.

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I had an geek’s evening planned where I would watch the Mets and follow along on real-time search engine Collecta. Sadly, this is not the first time (this week) I have done something similar, but usually I do it via my @METSorYANKEES twitter feed.

Doing this is the definition of social media, since I can’t be a real social gathering with other fans, this way I get to exchange information, barbs, or frequently in the Mets case — bitching. One thing to note is that through Collecta I can’t directly contribute, but it made it very easy to find other Mets fans and add them to my twitter follows list and ping away.

Overall it was interesting, but it also changed my perception of this as “search” as we have come to know it. The search engine paradigm is that I want information, that information is stored in historical archives, and I use some words that surround the topic and this hopefully gets me an answer. On Collecta, it was more of watching history unfold. The results are partial pieces of the big picture, but as time — in this case the game — played on, it was up to me to follow along and piece everything together.

The flow of information was constant, but the content mixed during the evening. Here are some samples:

• play-by-play: “David Wright RBI single scores Angel Pagan, who slides under the tag at home. Mets trailing 6-4 now. 5th inning. #mets” by @citycynic
• commentary: “you know if the DBacks have shut down their offense for the night like we normally would, we could actually get back in this one.” byMetsWFAN @
• pictures: From carryboo on Flickr
• cheering: “Daniel Murphy goes yard. Mets are within one at 6-5. Wow. by @TheRopolitans”,
• of course, some bitching: my fav “The Mets suck!” By @pete807
• game recap just minutes after the final out: “Reynolds powers Diamondbacks past Mets 6-5 (AP)”

So the outcome of all this: First, the experience needs to be renamed from real-time search because anything called search eventually gets compared to Google by the mass audience. The only thing that it shares with the Google activity is that I type a query in a box and click. I this case the “Now!” button.
Second, it is the perfect complement to enjoying a live event on TV or radio. The endless stream of commentary is perfect for baseball which we all know has a lot of down time. However, I’m sure it will provide the same benefits for the American Idol and Lost crowds as their geek quotient increases.

Though the Mets lost this one, I think I found a new way to add some enjoyment to the game.

Take care, and Let’s Go Mets!

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