[rdfweb-dev] foaf.rdf as a requirement

[Jim Ley]

"Seth Russell" <seth at robustai.net>
> Leigh Dodds wrote:
>
> >There have been suggestions of using a standard naming convention of
> >"foaf.rdf" for the file -- so then we can use Google as another way to
find
> >FOAF documents.
> >
> >But thats not a requirement.
> >
>
> Actually this is an excellent idea !   But I think it *should* be a
> requirement.  I'm aware of the trend when writing standards to make only
> minimum restrictions,  but there are some times where the benefits of
> resticting far outweigh the loss of freedom.  This is such a case.
> Check out the list of foaf.rdf files provided by [1] below.  To be on
> this list is so very easy,  you give up so very little ... if we all did
> it, then the foaf space would be far easier to find.   Why not specifiy
> this as a requirement ?
>
> [1] http://www.google.com/search?q=foaf.rdf

Then compare it with those returned by searching on the foaf namespace, this
is already used thanks to Eric Vitello, and doesn't limit the naming of
files, and finds all the same I'm sure.
http://www.perceive.net/xml/googlescutterNoChatlogs.rdf

Also, foaf is a way of describing people, and it fits well with lots of
other vocabularies, it's pretty useless IMHO in isolation, foaf files
themselves only become useful and interesting (other than look at who these
people know wow factor) when combined with other vocabularies (who wrote
what documents, participated in what organisations etc.)  I have little
interest in foaf files alone.

Jim.