Authors:
Rizwan Mehmood
and
Hermann Maurer
Affiliation:
Graz University of Technology, Austria
Keyword(s):
Data Quality, Information Reliability, Data Integration Systems
Related
Ontology
Subjects/Areas/Topics:
Data Engineering
;
Data Management and Quality
;
Information Quality
Abstract:
Geographic web portals and geospatial databases are emerging on the web recently, offering information about countries and places in the world. Digital content is increasing at a staggering rate due to community collaboration and the integration of information from webcams and sensors. Like in case of Wikipedia, some geospatial databases allow everyone to edit the content. We cannot ignore the role of wikis and geospatial databases particularly Wikipedia, Wikicommons, GeoNames etc., as they have replaced the traditional encyclopedias and they are empowering information seekers by providing information at the door step. However, there is no guarantee of validity and authenticity of the information provided by them. The reason behind is that very little attention has been given to verify information before publishing it on the Web. Also, to find particular information about countries, web users mainly teachers, students and tourists rely on search engines
such as Google which often poi
nts to Wikipedia. We will identify some inconsistencies in online facts such as area, cities and mountains rankings using multiple data sources. Our investigations reveal that there is a need for a reliable geographic web portal which can be used for learning and other purpose. We will explain how we managed to devise a mechanism for collecting and verifying different facts. Our attempt to provide a reliable geographic web portal has resulted in a comprehensive collection covering a wide range of information aspects such as culture, geography, economy etc. that are associated with a country. We will also describe our approach to measure the reliability of geographic facts such as area, cities and mountains rankings for all countries.
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