Towards the Semantic Web : the Role of Multilingual Terminologies

Introduction MDA is the UK’s lead organisation in the documentation and management of information about collections. MDA holds SPECTRUM, the UK Museum Documentation Standard in trust on behalf of the sector, and is responsible for providing expert advice and guidance to thousands of professionals each year. MDA’s remit also covers the creation, management and deployment of standardised terminologies to support interoperability and publication of cultural content. The Semantic Web The Internet is a distributed network which facilitates access and use of resources by a global audience. The technological platforms through which these resources are shared are governed by agreed protocols designed specifically to enable machine-level interoperability. However, the current model of web publishing and resource discovery is based on relatively brute-force methods of matching terms to resources to identify relevant content. The Semantic Web is the next stage in the evolution of the Internet. Supported by widespread technical interoperability, the aim of the Semantic Web is to facilitate machine-level ‘understanding’ of digital content, and thereby to facilitate the processes of discovery and retrieval. The opportunities arising from the Semantic Web are significant. Intelligent agents which are able to contextualise data rather than simply search for documents pave the way towards the kind of mediated, qualitative experience which will enable the web to act as both a global