Google, in the midst of its I/O conference (see our story here), also has teamed up with NASA to form the Quantum Artificial Intelligence Lab at the agency’s Ames Research Center.

According to a post on Google’s Research Blog, the lab will house a D-Wave Systems quantum computer. The goal is to study how quantum computing can solve some of the most challenging computer science problems, with a focus on advancing machine learning. Machine learning, as Director of Engineering Hartmut Neven writes, “is all about building better models of the world to make more accurate predictions,” but it’s hard work to build a really good model. Real-world applications that he discusses include building a more useful search engine by better understanding spoken questions and what’s on the web to provide the best answer.

Read more

The 2013 International Semantic Web Conference (ISWC) is coming to Sydney, Australia’s biggest city, October 21- 25 2013.  “The weather should be warming up beautifully for spring,” says  local chair Kerry Taylor, “and I’d like to promise you sunny days and sparkling views. The first two days, Monday and Tuesday will be held at the Sydney Masonic Centre, an architecturally-significant  ‘new brutalist’  building in the southern CBD. Wednesday to Friday will be held at the Sydney Conference and Exhibition Centre, in the tourist precinct of  Darling Harbour, with views over the water and the city.  Summer Daylight Saving will have begun, so you can enjoy the evenings too after each day of intense  scientific exchange.”

Read more

Liat Clark of Wired reports, “The European Commission is off-track and will stifle innovation with its data protection proposals because it’s only just catching up with web 2.0, a term coined in the 90s, according to James Leaton Gray, head of information policy and compliance at the BBC. He issued this warning at the Westminster eForum seminar on eprivacy, flagging up the impracticalities of the proposed reforms, pointing out that the future of computing is in your TV — and the proposals aren’t taking this into account. ‘It makes me extremely nervous,’ said Gray. ‘If you look at IPTV, you’re connected to the internet and directly to thousands of TV channels across the world. The present remote control will become a search engine — it won’t be things you type into, it will be about the semantic web, accessing and exchanging data. The idea that it’s confounded to computers and a computer-based world is a fallacy’.” Read more

[Editor's Note: This guest post is from Antonia Bradford, who attended "ICT Days" in Trento Italy, and offered this report.]

Trento, Italy, hosted a technology conference ‘ICT Days 2013’ between 20th and 23rd March. Like all such events it was interesting, dynamic and informative, but it was also quite different from the normal conferences.

It broadcast a very loud message that Semantic Technology, Big Data, and the interconnectivity of things will – without any doubt – affect everything and everyone; that these technologies will change the way everyone interacts with public services, the way in which dwindling natural resources are distributed and managed, the way citizens interact with each other, the way in which public and private bodies cooperate to support the needs of the citizen and the way in which public bodies are monitored and held accountable to the people that elected them.

Read more

Dave McComb of Semantic Arts recently commented on Gartner’s nod to Semantic Technology. McComb writes, “Gartner has, finally, nominated Semantic Technology as one of their Top Technology Trends. We’ve seen this movie before. We know how it ends. Indeed it was Gartner themselves who named the plot trajectory: the ‘hype cycle.’ It’s worth a pause to reflect on why the hype cycle exists. The hype cycle suggests that a new technology follows a development growth path as predictable as egg to caterpillar to chrysalis to butterfly. In the hype cycle, the stages are [pictured above].” Read more

A collaborative initiative by the three University of California campuses in Southern California (Los Angeles, San Diego, and Irvine) has been announced. UCLA, UCSD, and UCI are coming together for the first time to form a semantic Computing Consortium. The intent of the consortium will be to ally Semantics from both the Industry/Commercial and Academic Perspectives, not only to promote the technology, but also to create an infrastructure usable to all participants, in addition to stimulating the interest of this still nascent, but extremely powerful technology.

The existence of the Semantic Computing Center will undoubtedly have a powerful and positive impact on the Southern California community in general, as well as facilitate significant advancement and progress in the Arena of Semantic Computing, from both an academic and commercial prospective. Having such a powerful consortium here in Southern California is an extremely exciting prospect and will facilitate in defining/creating Southern California as a high tech strip with respect to Semantic Computing.

Read more

Ivan Herman of the W3C reports, “W3C published the Second Edition of the Rule Interchange Format (RIF). RIF was developed through a joint effort of members of the Business Rules, Semantic Web, and Logic Programming communities. It allows rules systems to be connected together for highly-structured knowledge to be accurately exchanged as explained in RIF Use Cases and Requirements. The Second Edition includes editorial improvements and a number of small corrections to the original specification, along with a new RIF Primer.” Read more

Kim Zetter of Wired reports, “The suicide last month of coder and internet activist Aaron Swartz prompted an outcry about the manner in which a U.S. attorney used anti-hacking legislation to launch a heavy-handed prosecution for what many considered a minor infraction. Federal prosecutors in Boston defended their actions, saying they were only upholding the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, under which Swartz was charged. But two lawmakers are proposing long-overdue changes to the law that would help prevent prosecutors from overreaching in their use of the law, as has occurred in a number of cases in recent years.” Read more

Rebecca Burn-Callander of Management Today reports that Twitter has acquired Bluefin Labs for $70 million. She writes, “Twitter and TV, a match made in heaven. In fact, the social network has even released its own report entitled ‘Tune in with Twitter’, all about the burgeoning love affair between the small screen and its new ‘second screen’.  ‘The relationship between Twitter and television is strongly symbiotic,’ it says. ‘Users love talking about what is happening on TV, TV viewers love using Twitter to see other viewers‘ opinions.’ And you just have to look at the volumes of tweets generated by the Superbowl on Sunday, and the amount of 140-character dialogue dedicated to each new episode of The Undateables or Girls or My Mad Fat Diary to confirm the theory.” Read more

[Editor's Note: SemanticWeb.com has secured a discount with OMG for the event outlined in the release below. SemanticWeb.com readers can receive a 15% discount when registering for the Semantic Information Day by entering the discount code: SEVA1 .]

The Object Management Group (OMG®) will be holding a Workshop and Information Day on Semantics at its quarterly technical meeting in Reston, VA. The event will take place on Tuesday, March 19^th and Wednesday, March 20^th at the Hyatt Regency hotel.

The event will give attendees the option to focus on the uses of semantics in three key industries: healthcare, finance and government.

“Semantic technologies are remaking financial services, healthcare, manufacturing, and even defense systems,” said Dr. Richard Soley, Chairman and CEO of OMG. “The purpose of the Semantic Information Day is to explore how semantics can be used in these industries while laying the groundwork for future semantic-based standards.”

Read more