“Data! Data! Data!” he cried impatiently. “I can’t make bricks without clay.” – Sherlock Holmes, from The Adventure of the Copper Beeches.

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According to a definition on LinkedData.org, “The term Linked Data refers to a set of best practices for publishing and connecting structured data on the web.” This has enormous implications for discoverability and interoperability for libraries, archives, and museums, not to mention a dramatic shift in the World Wide Web as we know it.

Data is increasingly driving the internet economy, and innovations in the Semantic Web and Linked Data offer glimpses into the future of what many are calling Web3.0. But aside from advertisers predicting our behavior and better targeting consumers, what is it good for? What exactly is it and what does it do? And perhaps most importantly, what are the possibilities for harnessing this technology to increase human knowledge and forward the common good?

In this presentation, we'll explore the fundamental elements of Linked Open Data and discover how rapidly growing access to metadata within the world's libraries, archives and museums is opening exciting new possibilities for understanding our past, and may help in predicting our future.

This event will be webcast with the generous support of the Smithsonian CTO Series. You can view the live stream here, and we'll share the archived version once we have it.

~45 min. talk, ~30 min. Q&A. 

This event is being hosted by the Smithsonian Institution as part of LODLAM-DC, with support from the Sloan Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities.  The event is free and open to the public.  

About the speaker

Jon Voss (@jonvoss) is helping to build an open ecosystem of historical data across libraries, archives, and museums worldwide. In his work at the intersection of history and technology, he’s jumpstarting important projects ranging from the development of institutional infrastructure (like Linked Open Data, and game-changing conferences and working groups) to consumer facing web and mobile products.

Voss is the Strategic Partnerships Director of Historypin, a location-based community driven public history project. He recently organized the first International Linked Open Data in Libraries, Archives and Museums Summit, hosted by the Internet Archive and funded by the Sloan Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities. He's also the project manager of Civil War Data 150, a collaborative project utilizing Linked Open Data to connect and discover information about the American Civil War during the 150th anniversary.

Directions

See directions to the National Museum of the American Indian on the National Mall.

Information about the Rasmuson Theater.