Earlier today I hit the publish buttons on the blog posts announcing the shutdown of Kasabi and the end of Talis’s semantic web activities. Neither of those were easy to write.
My time at Talis — which will have been four years in September — has been a fantastic experience. I’ve worked with some incredibly talented people on a wide range of projects. The culture and outlook at Talis was like no other company I’ve worked for; it’s a real pleasure to have been part of that. I’ve learnt an massive amount in so many different areas.
I’d argue that Talis more than any other company has worked incredibly hard to promote and support work around the Semantic Web and Linked Data. And I’m really proud of that. Despite increasing — but still slow — adoption, the decision was made that there was only so much more that could be done, and that it was time for Talis to focus elsewhere. Over the next few weeks I’ll be winding up Talis Systems’ activities in that area, and working with existing customers on continuity plans.
This year has been very difficult, on a number of levels. On the whole I’m now glad that I can focus on the future with a fresh outlook.
In the short term I’m considering freelance opportunities. If you’re interested in talking about that, then please get in touch. My profile is on LinkedIn and I’m available for work from 1st August.
Longer term, I want to take some time to think about the kind of work that I enjoy doing. I love building products, particularly those that are heavily data-driven. I want to build something around Open Data. Beyond that I’m not yet sure.
If you have something that you think I could help with, then I’d love to hear from you.
Lost Boy 
Leigh, I’m sorry to hear that and hope all goes well. Best of luck for the future to you and all at Talis/Kasabi.
Was a pleasure working with you guys both in my role at OS and as an enthusiast through Kasabi/family tree linked data. All the best for the future Leigh.
The Open Data Institute are looking to recruit a technical director (http://theodi.org/drupal7/node/8). The link to the job specification was broken when I tried it just now, but you might like to consider applying. (I suspect the job to be based in London.)
There are a bunch of universities in the UK that will be trying to develop linked open data following the lead of Southampton, Lincoln, Oxford, Edinburgh etc… Quite how these educational organisations will collaborate with local authorities and small and mid sized enterprises to map everything out remains to be seen.
Hey, no worries, we can just move all that Kasabi stuff over to Needlebase. Oh, wait.
Very sad to learn this but I have no doubt that your skills and experiences will find a new home, very very soon. KUTGW and all the best for your next steps, Leigh!
My comment seems to have vanished. Did it fail moderation? 😦
Hi,
I’ve been approving all comments. I’ve not deleted anything (that I’m aware of!)
Oh well, it was mostly what danbri said but shorter 🙂 Thanks for all your hard work.