Intelligent agents without the hype: why they work best with well structured content

• Published in: Business Information Review Vol. 19; no. 4; pp. 22 - 28
• Main Author: Knowles, Chris
• Format: Journal Article Trade Publication Article
• Language: English
• Published: Thousand Oaks, CA SAGE Publications 01.12.2002; Sage; Bowker-Saur Ltd
• Subjects: Business information; Computer programming; Content analysis; Exact sciences and technology; Information and communication sciences; Information and document structure and analysis; Information processing and retrieval; Information professionals; Information retrieval systems. Information and document management system; Information science. Documentation; Intelligent agents; Interfaces. Software; Internet; Online information retrieval; Sciences and techniques of general use; Searching; Software; Software industry; Studies; Vrisko; World Wide Web; United Kingdom; Europe; United Kingdom > UK; Task difficulty; Semantic web; Description; World wide web; Document structure; Information processing; Software; Economic information; Intelligent agent
• ISSN: 0266-3821; 1741-6450
• DOI: 10.1177/026638202761175347

A practical example and real-life case study is presented illustrating how one UK software company, Vrisko, has approached and managed the issues and problems of developing intelligent agent software and applying it in a business context. Describes some of the lessons learnt by the company in building applications which are currently being used by knowledge intensive organizations such as Citigroup, the world’s biggest bank and Linklaters, the UK’s second largest law firm, to interface with highly structured content from some of the world’s major business and financial publishers. Highlights the importance of content and the way content is organized and structured, to reinforce the point made by various pundits, that intelligent agent software works best with well structured content. Offers four predictions: that online content will be better organized and structured; that intelligent search tools will continue to improve; that users will expect external content integrated with their internal applications and intelligent agents to reflect and support their internal business processes; and that the skills of information professionals will become even more important, as organizations increasingly use intelligent agents and other technologies to build applications which optimize the value of information to their business.