Business Models for Semantic Web

Today's world-wide web consists mainly of html pages which people view using browsers. In the late 90's IE - Netscape war was one of the hottest wars for maintaining authority on the internet. Browsers are till today the main entry point for viewing content on the Web. Content Providers publish content via HTML and big content providers like Yahoo earn their revenue by advertising.

Today's content industry & web based services are to some extent supported by advertising. The google ADSense program took this advertising to the next level by building a store house which can provide advertisements to any small or big content publisher. Advertising has also in some sense become a lifeline even for consumers to have free services on the web.

The world wide web has grown so big, its not possible for people to sneak each and every corner of the web. People are increasingly feeling the need for content to come back to them depending on their interests rather they going and search for it. They would like to divulge certain tedious or repetitive tasks to software agents which can handle them well on their behalf.

I will like all my resources (content I read or services I use) to be adapted according to my own needs. I want an agent to look and inform me of the best deal for a camera. In this world, where software agents work, what role do current business models for advertising play? They appear to me will slowly fade away in the dark. Things are beginning to already appear with RSS, where users are increasingly viewing information via rss readers or directly in their email boxes rather then going on the web. As we go forward with more and more metadata on the web, demand for user adaptable content and services will increase.

In such a situation, where users don't access content the way the content provider provides, but in a way they want; how can content providers sustain themselves? How can users still get subsidised or free services on internet in a future semantic web scenario where agents are brokering on my behalf?

One solution I can think is the advertising itself can mature from just being static (content or images) to be itself a service. My software agents when looking for content on bbc site for me, also check the metadata based advertisements on bbc's site to get recommendations or in other cases might negotiate some deal.

The next question will be to what extent can these "smart advertisements" lure software agents ?