Hi everyone! I’m building Seamantic, a Mastodon client that introduces the “semantic feed” — a way to interact directly with the Semantic Web.

Here’s how it works:

  • Ask Questions: Post queries to the semantic feed. Bots like SeBridge (which I introduced in an earlier post) connect to knowledge bases to provide answers by listening on Mastodon hashtags for queries.

  • Contribute Data: Insert data into the feed by posting insert-queries, helping bots grow their underlying knowledge bases.

  • Sea-Level: Track your balance—querying raises the “sea-level,” and contributing lowers it, encouraging collaboration. When the sea-level goes over a certain level, posting queries is blocked until the sea-level is lowered by contribution.

By connecting users and knowledge bases, the semantic feed creates a dynamic flow of high-quality, consensus-driven data.

What do you think of the idea? Feedback is always welcome.

  • @davidgro
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    76 days ago

    querying raises the “sea-level,” and contributing lowers it, encouraging collaboration. When the sea-level goes over a certain level, posting queries is blocked

    Yeah, this seems to assume that the set of people able and willing to make contributions overlaps the set interested in simply asking questions, and I can’t imagine that working. You know the rule that in any community 90% just lurk, 9% comment, and maybe 1% actually contribute. For everyone but the 1%, I foresee querying until they hit the limit, then they leave.

    This might be somewhat mitigated by it being a very technical system to begin with, so even being interested in queries is a barrier.

    • @blue_berryOP
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      5 days ago

      Yeah, I know, thats a big problem of the idea. The answers would need to be really good and the querying simpler.

      • Pup Biru
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        25 days ago

        i mean, the sea level doesn’t have to be a limit… people edit wikipedia etc or contribute to reddit just because they like their number to be higher or their community reputation. i get that it’s meant to encourage contribution, but i think you’ll get more contribution by people just wanting to make the information better

  • mesamune
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    26 days ago

    I guess im a bit confused. Maybe I would need to see it in action in order to understand.