Web of Intent

Source: http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2010/08/17/the-greasy-fix-it-web-of-intent-vis...

Yes, it seems there is yet another buzzword to grasp and perpetrate as the next "thing," webwise: "web of intent." But, this one seems set to take off, unlike the seemingly eternal wait for so-called "semantic web" technologies to flourish - heck, emerge would suffice at this stage! According to Nova Spivack, from this post:

A Web of Intent is a participatory web: a web where we’re active consumers of content. Webs of Intent are an extension of the remix culture that has emerged. (Spivack, Trailmeme and the web of intent)

Seems straightforward but this says nothing of the power behind the idea of injecting intention in the computing power of the web. The majority of Spivack's post evaluates something called Trailmeme, a Xerox project currently still in private beta.

Essentially, the idea goes like this, users tag and store articles or digital objects (anything, really) that the encounter online thus creating many paths (trails) between these in a relational way. These paths can then be followed by others in various contexts or through the various "intentions" of the browser, or that the browser possesses, in relation to the information. Spivack notes:

The first step to ensuring intention is to promote systems that are inherently based on engagement and action, not passive consumption (e.g., more clients upon clients). (Spivack, Trailmeme and the web of intent)

I agree completely. This draws upon and/or relates to Clay Shirky's idea of "cognitive surplus" (his excellent TED Talk here) in addition to revealing yet another way we can get data linked (in a linked data, semantic web kinda way) in meaningful and intentional ways. I'm not really connecting dots in really revolutionary way here. All of this fits together fairly obviously. But, articulating it helps me to imagine solutions, concrete solutions for implementation. Trailmeme is a nice idea. Let's see more!

I will definintely follow the development of "web of intent" projects - have added "web of intent" filter to Tweetdeck as a first start. And, according to Matthew Kumin, we should all get started (post here) as the "web of intent is coming (sooner than you think)." Highly recommend Kumin's post. He sketches out a promising future for the "web of intent" and it's forthcoming services and implementations.