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I have been discussing progress in semantic knowledge structures with Entrepreneur and Researcher Sam Chapman of K-Now who has recently left the University of Sheffield, Department of Computer Science, in the United Kingdom to go full-time into the delivery of semantic technologies in the enterprise. His attendance at the ISWC 2008 has created some momentum to engage new corporations in a discussion on a recently presented paper on "Creating and Using Organisational Semantic Webs in Large Networked Organisations" by Ravish Bhagdev, Ajay Chakravarthy, Sam Chapman, Fabio Ciravegna and Vita Lanfranchi. Knowledge management has shifted as evidenced in his paper. He contends with others that a more localized approach based on a particular perspective of the world in which one operates is far more useful than a centralized company view. All-encompassing ontologies are not the answer, according to Chapman. In the paper, his team indicates:

A challenge for the Semantic Web is to support the change in knowledge management mentioned above, by defining tools and techniques supporting: 1) definition of community-specific views of the world; 2) capture and acquisition of knowledge according to them; 3) integration of captured knowledge with the rest of the organisation's knowledge; 4) sharing of knowledge across communities.

Humans are classification machines. We love to categorize and segment our lives into neat little piles. Have you ever sighed in joy after finally getting around to cleaning up that cluttered garage?   There are even games where the object is to build order from disorder. We solve Rubik's cubes and prune our shrubs and pick up our socks and put them in the hamper. As the father of two boys, I'm generalizing of course.

People are much better at seeing semantic relationships than any machine. We can tell latte from onion rings. We know how Paris Hilton is related to Larry King. We understand the concept and purpose of underpants. Despite decades of research, and many, many smart person-hours dedicated to cracking that nut, computers still have no clue.