Updated summary
Target groups for dissemination
Evaluation strategy
Outreach to Europe
Activities with other IST projects
In the previous version of this document, SWAD-Europe described seven steps to increase outreach in the target groups and evaluate the extent of that outreach. This summary describes in brief the results of taking each step, and evaluates the success of each step as described in step 7 below.
We have done this by using the contents of the SWAD-Europe weblog[2] and mailing out a selection of articles every month to the public-esw-news@w3.org mailing list[3]. The SWAD-Europe weblog has an RSS 1.0 feed[4], which means that the articles appear in aggregators such as Planet RDF[5] and also in weblog search engines such as Feedster[6].
The main aim of the newsletter was to enable the project to discover who it was reaching. Uptake of the newsletter has not been very high with 34 (not including project members) individuals on the two mailing lists that receive the newsletter. However, the newsletter is an edited version of the weblog, and so has ensured there are plenty of articles there, which means that our reading audience is high although difficult to evaluate, as the articles are syndicated through the use of RSS 1.0.
The main aim here was to try to evaluate who was using SWAD-Europe outputs.
For technical reasons integrating the questionnaire with the rest of the website proved to be more difficult than anticipated. However, we have done an analysis[7] of the individuals we have interacted with in workshops and via the mailing lists and tshirt distribution, to produce a breakdown of the sectors we are reaching. It is worth bearing in mind that our reach is much wider than implied by this analysis - in particular, regular weblog entries and activity in the wiki reach a large number of individuals via RSS syndication.
We have done this for workshops held since the peer review: developer workshop 4 (Semantic Web Storage and Retrieval) [8], 5 (Image Description)[9] and 6 (Introduccion al uso de la Web Semantica)[10]. The results from developer workshop 4 are available[11].
See Dissemination and Use Plan[7], section 5 - Evaluation.
The aim here was to work with other IST projects more closely. We have produced a document describing RSS and events[12], although it did not lead to closer working with our target project KTWeb[13].
However, throughout the project we have worked closely with individuals funded by the IST programme, through our participation in various W3C working groups and the Semantic Web Interest Group[14]. This is particularly true now as we have several project member working on the Semantic Web Best Practices Working Group[15], whose aims[16] are very close to those of SWAD-Europe[17]. In particular KnowledgeWeb[18] is well-represented on the SWBP working group.
We also plan to hold a joint workshop with DERI Galway in September 2004, linking with the various IST-funded projects (SDK-Cluster[19]) coordinated there.
See workshops and conference sessions[20], talks[21], FAQs[22].
This updated document forms this re-evalation.
In the review it was felt that of these, outreach to internet and Open Source and content and tool producers had been fairly strong, while outreach to academics and industry could be improved. It was also felt that the project was too UK-centric, and that better European outreach was important, including activities with sister IST projects such as KTWeb.
Previously, we had some evidence about outreach to the communities we are concerned with. For example, the attendees at the SWAD-Europe Semantic Web calendaring workshop in Bristol[23] were a good mix of academic and business, Open Source and other content producers. Similarly the virtual meetings on RDF calendaring and querying we have held since (see [1]). However these are relatively small groups of people interacting heavily with the project, and we would have liked to be able to evaluate the project's impact on the much larger number of people who use resources developed by the Ãproject, such as the website, the wiki, and the weblog.
Unfortunately, because the SWAD-Europe site is part of the W3C site, obtaining statistics detailed enough to be useful in terms of evaluating which target groups are accessing the website, wiki and weblog is not possible because of the W3C's Privacy policy[24]. Web statistics are themselves notoriously unreliable. Furthermore, the idea of asking users to fill in a short questionnaire before receiving the newsletter was not successful, with almost no new additions to the mailing list after the newsletter was created.
In order to objectively evaluate the project's impact, insofar as is possible, we planned to focus effort on collecting information about the users of the website, where the project's reports are held. We planned to achieve this by inviting visitors to the site to subscribe to a monthly email newsletter, allowing us to ask them one or two questions about the sector they were in, enabling us to track our outreach efforts. We also wanted to produce the newsletter information as an RSS feed, to maximise its outreach possibilities.
For the reasons described above, the questionnaire was not implemented, although it would have made little difference, since so few people opted to receive the newsletter. However, the RSS feed has resulted in wide (although difficult to evaluate) syndication of our project results and FAQs.
As planned the Dissemination and Use Plan has been updated as of May 2004 and will be updated again at the end of the project to reflect what we know about our users. This information will also inform the Technical Implementation Plan (TIP).
We are continuing to hold workshops and talks in Europe. A workshop was held in Amsterdam in November 2003[25], and two more are planned for June 2004 (one in Spanish) [9] [10]. The final workshop will be held in Ireland in conjunction with the SDK Cluster, in September 2004. SWAD-Europe had a poster at the European Semantic Web Symposium (ESWS) 2004 and used this opportunity to talk to other IST projects there.
Our previous plan was to liaise with KTWeb[13] about using Semantic Web technologies to distribute their events feeds. Our aim was to produce a best practice document for using RSS and events together and then contact related IST projects to see if they can output their information in this way as well. Members of SWAD-Europe will also attended the KTWeb workshop: Knowledge and Content Technology research - the past and the future, December 2-3 2003, Luxembourg.
However, KTWeb ended in December 2003, and although our best practice document on RSS and events was published[12], It has not been used by KTweb. Our attention has focussed on FP6 projects started in 2004, especially those in the SDK Cluster[19]. We are holding our final workshop in conjunction with the SDK Cluster (DERI Galway) and we had a poster at ESWS 2004[26].
[1] SWAD-Europe Deliverable 3.5: Dissemination and Use
Plan
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/reports/dissemination_use_plan/
[2] SWAD-Europe weblog
http://esw.w3.org/mt/esw/
[3] public-esw-news
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-esw-news/
[4] SWAD-Europe weblog RSS 1.0 feed
http://esw.w3.org/mt/esw/index.rdf
[5] PlanetRDF
http://planet.rdfhack.com
[6] Feedster
http://www.feedster.com/
[7] Presentations are documented in the Dissemination and Use
plan
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/reports/dissemination_use_plan/
[8] SWAD-Europe Developer Workshop Report 4 - Workshop on
Semantic Web Storage and Retrieval
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/reports/dev_workshop_report_4/
[9] SWAD-Europe Workshop on Image Description 7 and 8 June 2004,
Madrid, Spain.
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/events/200406-img/Overview.html
[10] SWAD-Europe Introduccion al uso de la Web Semantica
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/events/200406-esp/
[11] Workshop on Semantic Web Storage and Retrieval -
evaluation
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/reports/dev_workshop_report_4/#evaluation
[12] Documented on the SWAD-Europe weblog
http://esw.w3.org/mt/esw/
[13] KTWeb
http://www.ktweb.org/
[14] Semantic Web Interest Group
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/interest/
[15] Semantic Web Best Practices and Deployment Working
Group
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/BestPractices/
[16] Semantic Web Best Practices and Deployment (SWBPD) Working
Group Charter
http://www.w3.org/2003/12/swa/swbpd-charter
[17] SWAD-Europe: Project Fact Sheet
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/factsheet/
[18] KnowledgeWeb: IST-2004-507482, FP6-507482
http://kw.dia.fi.upm.es/semanticportal/jsp/frames.jsp
[19] SDK Cluster
http://www.sdk-cluster.org/
[20] SWAD-Europe workshops
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/events/
[21] SWAD-Europe presentations
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/#presentations
[22] SWAD-Europe FAQs
http://esw.w3.org/mt/esw/archives/cat_frequently_asked_questions_faqs.html
[23] SWAD-Europe Deliverable 3.7: Developer Workshop Report 2 -
Semantic Web calendaring
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/reports/dev_workshop_report_2/
[24] W3C privacy statements
http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Legal/privacy-statement-20000612
[25] SWAD-Europe Workshop on Semantic Web Storage and Retrieval
13-14 November 2003, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam,
Netherlands
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/events/20031113-storage/
[26] ESWS 2004
http://www.esws2004.org/