<foaf:community>?

[The Emperor <the_emperor at m...>]

Bill,

> > but it should be possible to actually express things without that 
and
> > go for:
> >
> > <foaf:Person>
> > <foaf:name>Someone</foaf:name>
> > <foaf:mbox_sha1sum>1239474747474747474</foaf:mbox_sha1sum>
> > <rdfs:seeAlso rdf:resource="http://domain.com/foaf.rdf" />
> > <dc:Relation>
> > <rdf:Description>
> > <dc:Relation.Type>isPartOf</dc:Relation.Type>
> >
> > <dc:Relation.Identifier>http://xmlns.com/wordnet/1.6/Moderator-
> > 2</dc:Relation.Identifier>
> > </rdf:Description>
> > </dc:Relation>
> > </foaf:Person>
> 
> I don't see where you're making a statement as to what group this 
person
> moderates.

Yes sorry I wasn't being very clear there. Obviously its not 
desirable for the user to define their relationship with the 
community. I am generating a list of the members FOAF files:

http://development.gurusnetwork.com/foaf/cache/gn_meta.php?view_as=xml

but what I wanted was a way to mark that file up in a way that both 
defined the community (its name, interests, etc.) and the 
relationship of the member to the group - which is where the relation 
business would be slotted in. Which would then give have some 
authority as to people's 'official' position in the community (being 
n the list would be sufficient to prove you are a member).

> I'm not sure that's the right way to use a wordnet URI as well. 

I suspect it isn't - any advice is gratefully received on that one.
> 
> > It should then be possible to use something similar to define its
> > position within a group or groups with the link up to the wider 
group
> > being a simple link while the group file would hold more data 
about
> > the relationship with the subgroups and the communities, etc.
> 
> Sure, a group could indicate it has another group as it's members I 
suppose.
> I'd wonder how that subgroup would indicate it "considers itself" 
part of that
> parent group. The relationship of group having members tied to 
members
> expressing group membership is a little easier to mentally manage. 
How to
> escalate that up into larger group sub/super grouping gets a bit 
more sticky.
> I'm quite concerned that it be be possible to unabiguously 
state 'belonging'
> with some sort of provenance or trail of authority. It's one thing 
to say you
> want to belong to something. It's another to say that someone 
else 'ought' to
> belong to something. The user's own ability to override such 
external
> declarations about them seems like it's going to be important. As 
Groucho Marx
> once said "I'd belong to no group that would have me as a member."
> 
All good points (and you can't beat making a point with a quote from 
Groucho Marx ;) ). I can see that a top down approach would work for 
discrete entities like a web site, company, university, etc. but once 
the community gets larger and more vague like web designers, 
Buddhists, etc. it might be more difficult to do - although it might 
also not be necessary or desirable.

I'm sure there is a good solution to this (I'm just not sure what it 
is). I'll have to give this more thought.

> > OK thanks for those tips - It does look like it is possible to do
> > without any new namespaces. I suppose in the end the problem 
becomes
> > that the files are increasingly bloated when a new namespace could
> > simplify things and make the actual markup more meaningful.
> 
> I don't disagree that it often seems more efficient to just invent 
a new
> namespace. And that some of the examples and first-pass examples 
are often
> rather bloated. But it is possible to work around them and come up 
with
> something a bit more compact while expressing useful semantics (and 
be
> RDF-friendly in the process).
> 
OK good :) I'll keep fiddling and see what I come up with.

Regards,
Emps