What we have right now is a combination of the free rider problem ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_rider_problem ) with a dose of "tragedy of the anticommons" ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_anticommons ) for good measure.

The benefits would accrue to everyone, yet the costs are too high for unorganized / disparate interests to shoulder effectively.

Putting aside our philosophical differences, perhaps this forum is a place where a concrete strategy can be formulated to show how a 10?/30? mill investment can be spent on generating a minimal yet necessary family of interlingua ontologies to serve as a backbone for all the domain ontologies - hence actually realize one of the main purported benefits of ontologizing computing :P. In my mind, it doesn't seem wise to wait for the ground to be fully populated before generating such a tool. I fear ontology is going the way of AI in the 1980's, with a lot of promise, but little to show for it. Too many of my (smart) friends are turned off by ontologies because so much of what is out there is .... disappointing / infantile?

Pat C, you've proposed this $ figure -- how do you see it being spent? Assume that this money is there - what would be your priorities?

If it were in my hands, I would spend a good portion of this money in generating mappings b/w the existing ULO's.

In order to do so, I would also pick an expressive enough language (i.e. Common Logic) that could grow organically as new tools become available, yet would support existing technologies / ontologies too (i.e. OWL/RDFS).

I have many more ideas on this front, though i'll wait to see if this message gathers any traction or whether it is lost in the abyss of noise on the forum :D.

Ali

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