Before we leap into designing technical solutions, can we have a page
of design principles/requirements, to ensure we are all thinking the
same things?

For instance, I actually view the overarching problem as a set of
issues about AUTHORITATIVE data, OWNERSHIP and LONGTERM ACCESSIBILITY.

What are my requirements as a USER?

* I own my data
* I want to put it on the Net, so I can share it, access it anywhere
* I want to store my (functional) data in a single (functional) place
* I do NOT want to go back and ever move/transform my data
* I will allow (functional) applications access to my data
* I will be annoyed if any new application breaks my existing
applications

A simple set of requirements, but they break most of the existing
Internet business models of the last 5 years.  As an example, think
about your photos in Flickr.

The technical implications are potentially things like a five-tier
software architecture:
http://www.opengroup.org/architecture/togaf7-doc/arch/p4/views/vus_sw...

So what is the bigger problem?  And what are the fundamental
principles / requirements needed to resolve it?

Thanks, Mike

I like your thinking Mike,

I suggest you make a new page for it here on the google group and
start an outline - and encourage others to contribute!

Cheers,

Chris

Count me in to contribute

Ian

I started this page - start adding away.

On Jan 9, 5:28 am, maguffyn <maguf...@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

On 7 Jan 2008, at 23:57, Mike Pearson wrote:

I have a problem with the idea of ownership of data. Simply put: you  
cannot own data really.

First of all it makes no sense. Data only has value if you can trust  
it. Unless you have built the notion of trust into the notion of data,  
but I think that may be the concept of information...

What you can be is responsible for what you say.

If I publish a foaf file that says that my name is Henry, that I work  
for Sun, and that I have a number of friends, then this is a statement  
I am making. People who don't know me at all will not be able to  
distinguish me from a spammer. For them that information is less  
valuable. For people who do know me on the other hand, whome I have  
given my foaf file, this is good information because it comes from the  
source of the entity (me) who has a reason to keeping this ifnormation  
up to date: people will know how to contact me etc,...

In this file I can also make statements about other people. I could  
say that jane loves joe. Should I not be able to say that? Why? There  
is an economic reason which may reduce my desire to do so, in that by  
saying something like this I am increasing my work. Now I have to  
track jane and joe's love life, and it is known that this changes a lot.

So I don't believe so much in "ownership" of data. Rather putting  
graphs of relations on the web is a speech act. The value of that act  
depends on who makes it.

yes. I also want other people to be able to link to it.

No. All places on the web are identified by URIs. There is no reason  
why I need to put all my info at one URI.

Moving data is a problem because part of the value of information has  
to do with the idea of permalinks. Moving information will break other  
links to it.

yes

Hi, thanks for your feedback.  We probably have some different
understandings of the terms, so I will try to explain my understanding
better.

On Jan 9, 8:59 am, Henry Story <henry.st...@gmail.com> wrote:

Ownership means the exclusive right of possessing, enjoying, and
disposing of a thing.   People expect to own their data.

Electronic data has the characteristic that you can make copies, and
have two or more versions of the data.  Then you get interesting
issues like you gave someone else a copy of your data and they then
sell it, change it or deletes it.

As an example of the ownership issues -- I gave many of my details to
Facebook.  Some of those details will eventually be out-of-date.  If I
no longer use Facebook, do I have a right to tell them to stop using/
publishing my "out-of-date" data?  In the future, if I gave Facebook
access to the authoritative source for that data, do I have the right
to revoke access in the future (that's an ownership right).

My assumption was that most people manage/collect data related to a
single (function), in a single place.  For example, I put my (photo)
data in a single (photo) data store.  I put my (mail) data in a single
(mail) data store.  Thinking about this further, perhaps this is part
of the issue.  If we break apart (physical storage) from (application
service), we have less tension.

Perhaps then,

* I will pay someone (DATA STORAGE SERVICE PROVIDER) to physically
host my data on the net.
* I will pay for some tools to manage/manipulate my data (APPLICATION
SERVICE PROVIDER).
* I may participate in some communities that aggregate my data with
others (SOCIAL NETWORK APPLICATION SERVICE PROVIDER)
* I will have the right to withdraw access to my data from SOCIAL
NETWORKS.

My definition of what we are discussing (is this what you are
thinking?):

My (PHYSICAL) data is on the Net.  It may be distributed/replicated
across multiple physical file stores.  I trust my service provider to
keep it secure and give me access when/where I need it.  I would
expect to sometimes change my service provider, depending upon their
performance.  There would need to be a process for this.  This is
Physical Data Portability.

I do not wish to break my application links to my data.   This is
LOGICAL Data Portability.  So what is the nature of the permalink
system that links LOGICAL application link to PHYSICAL Data?
Technical solutions can be centralised or distributed.  Each solution
has its pros and cons.

Thanks for your feedback,
Mike

On 8 Jan 2008, at 22:28, Mike Pearson wrote:

I am as you are trying to explore these ideas. Thanks for playing along.

But data is not a 'good' that can be owned by someone. It is not like  
a car, where there can be only one person who has it, where if one  
person has it, the other does not.

Since there is no "good" that can be owned by one person or the other,  
there is no way to prove who has the data, and who is meant to own it.  
Take your birth date. What if I guess you birthday, or if I deduce it  
from other information, have I stolen something from you? What if you  
think that Jane loves Joe? Is that information that belongs to Jane or  
is information that belongs to Joe? Or is it information that belongs  
to you?

Really you are walking straight into first amendment issues here.

It is interesting to look at this example in more depth.

So let us say that I give some bits to a service provider to publish  
at a specific location. Publishing those bits at that location makes  
it clear that I am standing behind the statement those bits make. As I  
said people will trust this information depending on the trust they  
have in me.

Now imagine this service provider takes those same bits and gives them  
to someone else. What are they doing? Are they claiming responsibility  
for what the bits are saying? They could be taking on a lot of  
responsibility doing this. It could be very dangerous to them. At the  
most extreme those bits could say: "kill the person who gives you  
these bits".

And if they say that I say what the content of those bits says, then  
there are two possibilities:

  - they link people to the location where I placed those bits  
originally, and the reader can see that information too, so then what  
advantage does he get from the going through this intermediary?

  - either they don't link to the information or they do but the  
reader cannot access that information. The reader then he has to trust  
the intermediary to be telling the truth - the same intermediary that  
clearly was breaking a contract law. Also the information won't be up  
to date. And up to date information is a lot more valuable, because it  
can be the difference between truth and falsehood.

I would rather speak of contract law, rather than data ownership. If  
people use Facebook as a place they expect up to date information to  
be available, and Facebook publishes your information when you have  
told them that you are no longer keeping it up to date, then they are  
publishing information as if it were coming from you, when it does not  
in fact come from you. So they are lying. This can have huge  
consequences not just for you, but for all the people who are trusting  
Facebook and the data they are publishing. And what could be worse  
that loosing trust for an information provider?

Because information meshes very quickly with other information to  
build up in consequence more information, make a false claim, can soon  
lead to a lot of problems building up. Especially for people who don't  
want to take responsibility for what they are saying.

My point was that it does not matter where physically your data is,  
because you can access it all logically via URLs. I have photos on  
flickr and others on my own web server.

Interestingly the web comes with a mechanism to do this. By buying/
renting a domain name, you can move infrastructure provider without  
loosing your URLs.
I have done that recently. I moved from verio to gridzones and all my  
links still work correctly.

This won't be possible of course for my pictures on flickr. Here we  
would need to be able to ask flickr to provide HTTP redirects to get  
the same effect.

And to make it clear it is coming from you. (they are not just random  
bits)

Yes, and hopefully this will be open so that you don't get locked in  
by one tool vendor.

Yes. And the more this happens the less clear it will be where "your  
data" begins and other data ends.

Not completely. Once you have told me your phone number, you have no  
right to come to me and ask me to forget it. What you can do is stop  
publishing it, so that my information will over time be out of date.

The best way, as mentioned above is to own your own domain name. Then  
you can easily move what you call your physical data - the way certain  
pieces of metal are marked electronically - to other such machines,  
without anyone noticing any difference when using URLs.

But this won't always be the case. I have a lot of photos on flickr  
now with flickr URLs. I won't be able to move those pictures easily.  
Perhaps it should be a right for us to ask flickr to allow us, if we  
need to move pictures away from their service. They would have to  
provide a HTTP redirect for every picture moved.

Thanks for helping me develop some of these thoughts,

Henry