Obama Administration Using Technology Developed at NUI Galway

President Obama's administration is using an internet technology developed at NUI Galway -- its new website devoted to the $800 billion economic stimulus package. The administration's Recovery.gov site will employ a web standard, created at Digital Enterprise Research Institute (DERI), to bring an unprecedented level of transparency to the US Government.

Researchers at DERI focus on the Semantic Web, the next incarnation of the internet.  The Semantic Web is more intuitive because data is defined and linked. One of the outputs of DERI's research is called Semantically-Interlinked Online Communities or SIOC. Recovery.gov uses SIOC, which is aimed at connecting online community sites and internet-based discussions.

Creator of SIOC and lecturer in Electronic Engineering at NUI Galway, Dr John Breslin, says, "The possibilities afforded by deploying semantic technologies such as SIOC for government transparency are very exciting. Semantic technology allows the linking of government funding data, fed in from spreadsheets or forms, to contributions from the public, private organisations or the government themselves. This can be done not just within a single site but with external linked data from other public sources. You could imagine using this to discover the effect of how and where tax dollars and Euros are being spent on statistics for crime, education or innovation in a set of geographic regions.

George Thomas, chief architect with the US General Services Administration, announced that the Recovery.gov effort brings transparency to the government, allowing citizens and activists to access semantic data about everything from contracts and schedules to training and infrastructure costs.

Since 2003, Science Foundation Ireland with a Centre for Science, Engineering and Technology grant has supported DERI, which has grown to over 120 members over the last 7 years.

Professor Stefan Decker, Director of DERI, says, This is another example showing that investment in science and research has truly propelled Ireland into the forefront of technology. Our technology can bring a greater level of transparency and trust to governments as well as financial institutions - something that becomes increasingly important. The US Government has recognised this already."

SIOC keeps growing -- a range of applications including Yahoo! SearchMonkey and Drupal have used the DERI SIOC project.