1. What will the so called respondents think when they find out their personal comments
are being used for commercial use?
Is it really ethnography? Or have we crossed the line from observation to invasion?
Some argue that if the internet becomes open source, then we’re just using
information that’s publicly available. And don’t bloggers want their voice heard? Isn’t
that the whole point?
If this is where we’re heading as an industry, there’s some serious ethical guidelines we
need to consider. Not only would semantic web change how we work, but also the
skills we would need to stay ahead in the industry.
It could affect the way we approach training, the way we recruit, the kind of people
that end up in market research.
It could mean an entire transformation from this, to this. Only time will tell.
Works cited
Citations
1. 2 Radar Networks & Nova Spivack, 2007. Semantics of Social Connections. Retrieved 1 August 2009 from
http://novaspivack.typepad.com RadarNetworksTowardsAWebOS.jpg
3. 5. 6 Wikipedia. You Tube. Retrieved 2 August 2009 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_tube
4. Wikipedia. Semantic Web. Retrieved 2 August 2009 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seman
tic_web.jpg
7.8.9.10 Markoff, John. (2006, Nov 12). Entrepreneurs See a Web Guided by Common Sense. The New York
Times. Retrieved 2 July from http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/12/business/12web.html

2. Is our industry about to undergo the most radical change it’s ever seen? Has the research industry already missed the boat? There’s some players in the
Are we heading to an era where we will no longer need to ask anyone any questions? market who are embracing this already, and they’re people you probably wouldn’t
Let’s take a look. think of as researchers. Whilst their plans for 3.0 aren’t only about research, they’ve
already started working in our industry.
Research has come a long way over the years.
And today we think we’re pretty IBM have used the data mining “system to do market research for television
sophisticated in our online use. networks in the popularity of shows by mining a popular online community site.” (8)
(1) What’s more impressive, is their use of the “system to mine the buzz on college
websites to predict songs that would hit the top of the pop charts in the next two
But we’re heading in to the unknown. A place
weeks. A capability more impressive than today’s market research predictions.” (9)
that could make 2.0 look as high tech as the
fax machine. A place dubbed “semantic web”.
There’s a range of technology companies that are developing software for this new era.
(2) Interestingly, some of the early research in this area was originally commissioned by
intelligence and military agencies. (10). And it makes sense, after all they are the mas-
In its essence, semantic web is made up of two dimensions. It leverages the wealth of ters of collecting, observing, collating information and making important
data available online, with the increasingly sophisticated thinking power of computers. decisions based on it.
We are generating more and more data online, at an outstanding rate. We upload data, If research is to take on this direction then perhaps we should be thinking more like CIA
we blog, we share, we connect, we co-create, we upload some more, we Google, we agents than researchers?
wiki, we meet people, we upload “more than 13 hours of footage to You Tube every
minute.” (3). We have reached a point where the WWW now “contains at least 48 billion It would require a 180 degree shift in thinking and change the entire way we go about
pages.” (4) our work. We wouldn't need to ask behavioural questions, they’d already be out there.
We wouldn’t need to ask people what they think of our brand, they would have dis-
At the moment, we can only do simple tasks on the web, like order a pizza, check the cussed it already.
weather in Paris and book a holiday. Currently web pages “are designed to be read by
people, not machines.” (5). We search for keywords and we get pages that contain those We would need to shift our perception of what’s available online. Seeing it as a robust,
words, some of which are entirely irrelevant. credible and logical dataset, and then use the semantic ability of search engines to
delve in to it.
Computers are increasing their semantic ability. Meaning they will be able to gather and
structure information in a more intelligent way. A focus on ‘citizen insights’ would mean a huge change in our relationship with
respondents. There would be no more focus on trying to enhance them with
With semantic web computers won’t just blindly retrieve information, they will sweeteners like cash incentives, points and games. There would be no direct
understand more of the meaning behind web pages, so they will “perform more of the interaction with respondents, so it could mean our incentive costs drop right down to a
tedious work involved in finding, sharing and combining information on the web.” (6). big fat zero.
Which for research could mean we no longer need to ask questions, because the
answers are already out there.