A key source of revenue for the media and entertainment domain is ad targeting: serving advertisements to a select set of visitors based on various captured visitor traits. Compared to global media companies such as Google and Facebook that aggregate data from various sources (and the privacy concerns these aggregations bring), local companies only capture a small number of (high-quality) traits and retrieve an unbalanced small amount of revenue. To increase these local publishers’ competitive advantage, they need to join forces, whilst taking the visitors’ privacy concerns into account. The EcoDaLo consortium, located in Belgium and consisting of Adlogic, Pebble Media, and Roularta Media Group as founding partners, aims to combine local publishers’ data without requiring these partners to share this data across the consortium. This presentation describes the usage of Semantic Web technologies, allowing for a decentralized approach where federated querying enables local companies to combine their captured visitor traits, and better target visitors, without aggregating all data.

1. PUBLIC
DATA COLLABORATION TO INCREASE SCALE IN THE BELGIAN PUBLISHING SECTOR
DEVELOPING A KNOWLEDGE INTEGRATION LAYER

2. KIL
or: Knowledge Integration Layer
Ben De Meester – ben.demeester@ugent.be
Semantic Web Researcher (PhD)
Ghent University – imec – IDLab

3. KIL
Knowledge
Integration
Layer
3

4. KIL
Knowledge: data has the same meaning across enterprises
Integration: data is combined without sharing
Layer: on top of existing systems
4

5. Problem
Challenge
Solution
Results

6. Problem
Challenge
Solution
Results

7. 7

8. DOOGLE KNOWS 'EVERYTHING' ABOUT ME

9. DOOGLE KNOWS 'EVERYTHING' ABOUT ME
DOOGLE TRACKS ME EVERYWHERE
Doogle can reach me everywhere...

10. 10

11. DOOGLE KNOWS 'EVERYTHING' ABOUT ME
DOOGLE TRACKS ME EVERYWHERE
Doogle can reach me everywhere...

12. DOOGLE KNOWS 'EVERYTHING' ABOUT ME
DOOGLE TRACKS ME EVERYWHERE
Doogle can reach me everywhere...
... with low-quality profiles

13. TRACKING?
13
Ben McDanolds
Doogle

14. TRACKING?
14
Ben McDanolds
Doogle
Aha! He's a McDanolds fan!

15. TRACKING?
15
Ben Bugo Hoss

16. TRACKING?
16
Ben Bugo Hoss
Doogle
You're a McDanolds fan!

17. TRACKING?
17
Ben Bugo Hoss
Doogle
You're a McDanolds fan!!
Nyanrair

18. FLEMISH PUBLISHERS KNOW ME
High-quality profiles...
18

19. FLEMISH PUBLISHERS KNOW ME
High-quality profiles...
... with limited reach
19

20. TRACKING?
20
Ben Sporzo
He has an account,
subscription,
and often visits
the KAA Ghent website...
Must be a KAA Ghent fan.

21. TRACKING?
21
Ben Tenelet Sports
Hmmm... What would he
like?

22. TRACKING?
22
Ben Tenelet Sports
I know!
Sporzo
Hmmm... What would he
like?

23. TRACKING?
23
Ben Tenelet Sports
I know!
Sporzo
Hmmm... What would he
like?

24. Problem
Challenge
Solution
Results

25. CURRENT SITUATION
25
Reach
Quality
Doogle
Flemish publishers

26. GOAL
26
IMPROVE ADVERTISING REACH OF FLEMISH PUBLISHERS
Reach
Quality
Doogle
Flemish publishers
Flemish publishers

27. THE SOLUTION FEELS SIMPLE
Each publisher can track and reach its users with more information
Data is still high quality
27
COMBINE AND SHARE ALL THE DATA!

28. 28
Ad server
Ad request Ad response
Incorporation
User

29. BUT...
29

30. BUT...
Should we?
Enterprises lose their value (i.e., the data they have)
30

31. BUT...
Should we?
Enterprises lose their value (i.e., the data they have)
Can we?
Privacy + competition law
31

32. TECHNICAL CHALLENGE
How can we enable partial data sharing
without putting the data together?
32

33. Problem
Challenge
Solution
Results

34. IDLAB'S EXPERTISE
Semantic Web technologies
Data analysis
Data combination
34
Erik Mannens – erik.mannens@ugent.be
Ruben Verborgh – ruben.verborgh@ugent.be
Anastasia Dimou – anastasia.dimou@ugent.be

35. NOT ALL IN ONE POT
35
Ad server
Ad request Ad response
Incorporation
User

36. DATA STAYS WITH THE PUBLISHER!
36
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

37. CHALLENGES
1. Talk about the same things
Semantics
2. Combine data across publishers without putting it together
Federation
37

38. SEMANTICS?
38

39. SEMANTICS?
39
BASS

40. SEMANTICS!
40

41. SEMANTICS!
41

42. TECHNICAL SOLUTION
42

43. TECHNICAL SOLUTION
Map data to common data model (RML.io)
43

44. TECHNICAL SOLUTION
Map data to common data model (RML.io)
Common ID provider
44

45. TECHNICAL SOLUTION
Map data to common data model (RML.io)
Common ID provider
Combine data parts from different locations (Comunica)
45

46. 46
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

47. Problem
Challenge
Solution
Results

48. EXAMPLE
48
1. User visits webpage
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

49. EXAMPLE
49
2. Does this user like travel and sports?
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

50. EXAMPLE
50
2. Does this user like travel and sports?
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

51. EXAMPLE
51
3. Look for the information
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

52. EXAMPLE
52
4a. This guy likes travel!
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

53. EXAMPLE
53
4b. This guy likes sports!
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

54. EXAMPLE
54
5. Combine the results
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

55. EXAMPLE
55
6. Answer is YES!
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

56. EXAMPLE
56
7. User gets relevant advertisement
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation

57. ADVANTAGES
Data ownership doesn’t change
Publishers don’t know each other’s data
57
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation
DATA CAN BE COMBINED, AND…

58. ADVANTAGES
Data ownership doesn’t change
Publishers don’t know each other’s data
ID data doesn’t store profile info
58
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation
DATA CAN BE COMBINED, AND…

59. ADVANTAGES
Data ownership doesn’t change
Publishers don’t know each other’s data
ID data doesn’t store profile info
Layer between existing systems
Extensible to other publishers
59
KIL
Ad request Ad response
EcoDaLo ad server
User
Federation
DATA CAN BE COMBINED, AND…

60. KIL
Knowledge: data has the same meaning across enterprises
Integration: data is combined without sharing
Layer: on top of existing systems
60

61. Problem
Challenge
Solution
Results

62. ACADEMIC IMPACT
2 journal papers (1 accepted, 1 minor revision)
4 conference papers
1 demo
1 tutorial
62

63. PROJECT IMPACT
Flemish publishers can combine forces
to better target users and
reach them across publishers,
but are not required to share all data with each other
63

64. The KIL by IDLab shows that
Semantic Web technologies allow integration of data
across enterprises
without needing to share all data
64

65. PUBLIC
Ben De Meester – ben.demeester@ugent.be
Semantic Web Researcher (PhD)
Ghent University – imec – IDLab