Vivo (http://vivoweb.org/) is a platform for universities and academic institutions in general to manage and share their research outputs, communities and network. It is also one of the growing number of systems and tools that employ the principles and technology of linked data in an academic context. KMi’s Mathieu d’Aquin was invited in January to go present in a workshop organised by the consortium behind the Vivo platform, to discuss his experience in building the pioneering linked data platform of the Open University (data.open.ac.uk), the institutional and practical implications of such a platform, and generally the application of linked data in the higher education domain. A particular point of focus in this workshop was the way in which the linked data approach makes it possible to consider individual institutions such as the Open University as part of a more global network, sharing educational resources and academic-related information through semantic web technologies, as demonstrated in particular through the LinkedUniversities.org initiative led by Mathieu.
(see Mathieu’s presentation on slideshare)