An Entity Name System for Linking Semantic Web Data

In this paper, we argue that realizing the vision of the Semantic Web as an open and global decentralized knowledge space would greatly benefit from the availability of a large-scale service which may enable the systematic reuse of URIs across independently produced Semantic Web contents. Such a service, which we call an Entity Name System (ENS), might play for the Semantic Web the role that the DNS played for interlinking hypertexts on the Web. The key idea behing the ENS is that any tool/application for creating content (not only Semantic Web) may be empowered through simple plugins or extensions to interact with a network of ENS servers. Here we show how this has been done in a few prototypes for MS Word, Protégé and an editor for FOAF profiles.