Gov/en/Portal:R&D/Innovations:Structured Data: Difference between revisions

{{KidsIntro|"Structured data" means organising information so computers can read it and connect it, like putting a clear label on every box so the right machine can find what is inside. On WikiDeal, some data is private (your identity, your bank details, photos of a flat you want to rent out) and some data is public on purpose (the content of contracts people choose to publish, whether a contract was signed or completed, and overall usage statistics). One idea guides the whole effort: your habits and your commercial behaviour are not for sale. It is a bit like nobody being allowed to walk into your head or your home: what you buy, how you behave, and your private practices stay yours. To picture it, think of a babysitter who keeps their own qualifications and references and can show them to a family when asked, without any platform storing or reselling them.}}

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''This page describes a research direction, not a delivered feature. Everything below states what WikiDeal '''aims at''', '''intends to''' explore, or holds as an '''initial hypothesis'''. Nothing here is implemented yet.''

Structured Data is explored through several connected aspects, each a section below:

On most platforms today, if a service is free of charge, the user tends to be the product: behaviour is collected, analysed, and resold (a pattern often described as [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surveillance_capitalism surveillance capitalism]). WikiDeal '''is guided by''' the opposite principle. The intention is that there is no resale of users' habits or commercial tendencies, because the data is meant to belong to the users themselves.

A concrete illustration: a babysitter could hold their own qualifications, background-check results, and reputation history, present them to a family on request, and have them verified without the platform storing the underlying data. The same logic '''is intended to''' apply across the marketplace.

WikiDeal handles two distinct kinds of data, and the intended rules differ for each.

The structured-data work '''intends to''' cover both kinds (expressing them as [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_Description_Framework RDF], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JSON-LD JSON-LD], and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikidata Wikidata]-linked resources, in the spirit of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linked_data Linked Data] and the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_Web Semantic Web]) so each piece of information carries the right status and is machine-readable and interoperable. Governance of all this '''is intended to''' be decided in a '''participative context''', not dictated from above.

Structured Data '''aims at''' giving users the assurance that they sit inside trust networks ([[Gov/en/Portal:R&D/Innovations:Rings Of Trust|Rings of Trust]]) where they decide whether or not to share their data. Three guarantees sit at the heart of the design.

# '''Choose your trust circles.''' You would affiliate with the [[Gov/en/Portal:R&D/Innovations:Rings Of Trust|Rings of Trust]] you actually trust for data sharing. For example, a User Group offering a hosting service for tenants and landlords could store a member's structured data (photos of dwellings to rent, plus account and bank details) on a third-party server, because the user chose to trust that Ring. Sharing would follow the trust relationship the user opted into, not a platform-wide default.

Separately from personal data, WikiDeal '''intends to''' publish anonymized aggregate statistics. Personal data would stay private; only de-identified trends would be shared. The point is decision support: helping people and communities make informed decisions.

Aggregate figures would reveal broad trends and recurring conflict patterns, which in turn would let the community create alerts and improve contracts and safeguards before problems spread. In no case would specific user information be exposed, only listed aggregates such as: how many contracts of a given type were signed, how many were completed, how many ended in a dispute, what type of dispute, and how many disputes were solved.

WikiDeal '''is designed to be guided by''' minimising the platform's access to user data. Where mainstream platforms treat user data as a primary asset, collecting, analysing, and monetising it, WikiDeal '''intends to''' treat data as belonging to users, held only in trust, for minimum periods, in minimum quantities.

This direction is technically challenging (it requires careful design of conflict resolution, backup, and recovery) but it '''aims at''' changing the data power relationship: a platform cannot sell data it does not have. The intention is that, even when WikiDeal eventually serves many babysitters, tutors, and freelancers, it would not have built a surveillance corpus of intimate human behaviour.

WikiDeal '''is evaluating''' decentralised identity approaches ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decentralized_identifier decentralised identifiers, DIDs], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verifiable_credentials verifiable credentials], part of the wider [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-sovereign_identity self-sovereign identity] field) that '''aim at''' enabling trust between strangers without a central identity database. As above, a babysitter's qualifications and reputation could be held by the babysitter, presented on demand, and verified without the platform storing the underlying data. This research is ongoing through the WikiDeal [[Gov/en/Portal:R&D/Living-Labs|Living Labs]] programme.

WikiDeal '''is following''' the general development of the Decentralized Web closely, with or without blockchain. WikiDeal '''starts from''' a deliberately technology-neutral position: this is a starting point, not a settled stance. Positions on specific technologies '''are intended to''' be taken later, on the basis of exchanges, discussions, and position papers, some of which already exist and others still to be written. These '''are among the elements to be studied''', rather than decisions already made.

This connects to WikiDeal's broader stance: see [[Gov/en/Portal:Data/Blockchains|Blockchains & Smart Contracts]] for where blockchain and smart contracts are (and are not) considered appropriate, and [[Gov/en/Portal:Data/Decentralized-Data|Decentralized Data]] for the data-minimisation principles that underpin the approach. By expressing data as open linked resources, WikiDeal '''aims at''' keeping the door open to interoperate with these infrastructures as they mature, so the platform's information could stay open, portable, and owned by its community rather than locked into a single provider.

For marketplace Transactions, WikiDeal '''is exploring''' a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selective_disclosure selective disclosure] model: the intention is that parties would share only the data necessary to complete a Transaction, and that dispute resolution could proceed without exposing private communications to the operators unless legally required. How reputation could be presented while keeping the underlying ratings private is one of the open questions to be studied; no specific protocol is settled at this stage.

This research direction '''is intended to''' be developed in line with applicable data-protection and digital-identity law, not against it.

These are stated as '''design intentions and starting hypotheses''', to be confirmed with legal counsel as the project matures. Compatibility with other national and sector-specific legislation '''is intended to''' be assessed case by case.

The following is an '''initial hypothesis''', not a roadmap.

[[Category:Migration June 2026]]