What are Linked Open Data?

Data, when isolated, have limited potentiality; on the contrary, their value increases when one or more datasets, produced and published independently and by different subjects, offer the possibility of being integrated and interrogated between them in order to create new shared knowledge.

Advantages:

• Interoperability- thanks to the use of standard formats, LODs guarantee complete interoperability between different repositories both from a formal point of view (as they are encoded in a common format) and from a conceptual one (as they are defined using homogeneous classes).
• Reduce information duplication- those who create a dataset can link it directly to existing datasets that they do not have directly.
• More evidence- Linked Open Data helps generate meaningful links between web pages. This makes it easier for users to discover contents, highlighting the data produced by the institutions and increasing traffic to the websites of the institutions.
• Authoritativeness - Cultural institutions can establish themselves as authoritative sources of information on cultural heritage, creating a "backbone" for the development of the semantic web.
• New audience - when users analyse data and use it to create applications such as APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) and mashups, they propose your content to a new audience that would be otherwise difficult to reach.
• Better user experience - by providing users with high-quality and useful information you will improve their user experience; users will therefore be more likely to consult your website.