Soap operas and the semantic web

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Soap operas and the semantic web

• Celia Romaniuk
• Information Architect
• BBC
• space_at_shadowgirl.net

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SUDS

• SUDS is Used to Describe Soap operas

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Soap operas?

• EastEnders
• 14 million viewers, 20 years, soap opera, run by
  BBC
• Prime time
• www.bbc.co.uk/eastenders
• Gritty, realistic, character driven

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Content Management Project

• Redesign of web site
• Content modelling and metadata
• Controlled vocabularies, CM policy
• Relationship modelling

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FOAF

• Friend of a Friend
• Way of describing people and their relationships
  in XML/RDF
• A semantic web vocabulary or ontology
• SUDS extends FOAF

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RDF Triples
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FOAF classes
person
organisation
document
project
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FOAF properties
person
Given name Surname Nickname
Literal
person
document
Publications Weblog
person
person
Knows
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SUDS classes
person
organisation
character
family
award
event
programme
location
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An RDF Model character
Laura
Beale
Hannah
Waterman
person
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An RDF Model event
event
1999-02-02
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An RDF Model programme
1999-02-02
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Why model relationships?

• Content creation and maintenance
• Current process
• Episode database
• Personal memory
• Volunteers
• c.f. The Archers

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Character profiles family trees
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Users questions

• Characters
• How many wives has Ian had?
• Characters and locations
• Who have all the Queen Vic landlords been?
• People and programmes
• We hear about Phil's father a lot but has he ever
  appeared in the show?
• Why did Frank leave?
• Which characters have appeared in other TV shows?
• Which actors have played Mark Fowler?
• Secrets
• Does Steven know that Ian is not his real father?

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Content views

• Timelines
• Characters
• Families
• Locations
• Guides to events
• Past Valentines Days
• Weddings

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Methods

• Content indexing
• Search log analysis
• Ontology research
• Collaboration

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Early model
Location
Character
married to brother of slept with shot etc
owns lives at works at
Character
Episode
appears in
develops
plays
changes
Actor
Storyline
wins nominated for
appears in
Programme
Award
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Storylines Heros Journey
Separation
Return
Initiation
Transformation
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Storylines Season
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Storylines Soap operas
Programme
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On cliffhangers
Episode
Cliffhanger
Episode
Cliffhanger
Episode
Cliffhanger
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An RDF Model event
event
1999-02-02
date
marriage
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Episode update
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Modelling constraints secret properties

• Secrets
• Visible (known to all)
• Secret (from characters but known to audience) -
  e.g. gives birth to gender girlfriend/boyfriend
  of
• Embargoed (not to be made known to audience until
  a certain date e.g. Kat and Zoe)
• Need to keep historical state of the world.
• Scalability
• Connect people through an event where possible

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Implementation

• Schema
• RDF files (RDFAuthor)
• Query tool
• Iteration

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What next?

• Further development
• Other soaps

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Thanks
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Extras
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URLs

• FOAF-a-matic
• http//www.ldodds.com/foaf/foaf-a-matic.html
• FOAF vocabulary
• http//www.ldodds.com/foaf/foaf-a-matic.html
• EastEnders storylines and sociology
• http//www.aber.ac.uk/media/Modules/TF33120/buckin
  g1.html
• http//www.aber.ac.uk/media/Modules/TF33120/soaps.
  html
• http//www.museum.tv/archives/etv/E/htmlE/eastende
  rs/eastenders.htm
• Heross journey examples http//www.scu.edu/ethic
  s/publications/cblp/OrganizedELAProgram/HeroicJour
  neyExamplestext.html

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foafnaut accessories
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Audience Research

• "They just love it! (83 of comments positive)
  largely huge non-specific enthusiasm and
  adoration."

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Example content model
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FOAF-a-matic
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Iterations

• My general feeling is that metadata folk spend
  too much time worrying about getting schemas
  right, and not enough time deploying them and
  evaluating how things went afterwards.
• Dan Brickley
• http//groups.yahoo.com/group/rdfweb-dev/message/1
  68

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foafnaut
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Modelling constraints storylines
Heros journey
Separation
Initiation
Transformation
Return
Complex series
Episode
Series
Programme
Soap opera
Programme
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Early model
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EastEnders vs American soaps

• EastEnders differs from American soaps by its
  relentless emphasis on the mundane and
  nitty-gritty details of working class life
  among ordinary-looking (rather than attractive)
  and relatively unsuccessful people.
• (from museum.tv)