I like the proposal by Ian Davis to avoid the 303 cloud while try to fix the mistake of confusing identifiers with addresses in an address space.
Linked data URIs are already known to be subject to the same issues of ambiguity as any other naming convention.
All naming conventions are subject to ambiguity and “expanded” naming conventions, such as a list of properties in a topic map, may make the ambiguity a bit more manageable.
That depends on a presumption that if more information is added and a user advised of it, the risk of ambiguity will be reduced.
But the user needs to be able to use the additional information. What if the additional information is to distinguish two concepts in calculus and the reader is innocent of even basic algebra?
That is that say ambiguity can be overcome only in particular contexts.
But overcoming ambiguity in a particular context may be enough. Such as:
- Interchange between intelligence agencies
- Interchange between audited entities and their auditors (GAO, SEC, Federal Reserve (or their foreign equivalents))
- Interchange between manufacturers and distributors
None of those are the golden age of seamless knowledge sharing and universal democratization of decision making or even scheduling tennis matches sort of applications.
They are applications that can reduce incremental costs, improve overall efficiency and perhaps contribute to achievement of organizational goals.
Perhaps that is enough.
[…] suggests that properties help identify a subject representative in topic maps. For example, he says that … All naming conventions are subject to ambiguity and “expanded” naming conventions, […]
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