The W3C are stepping up work on the Semantic Web once more. They have recently launched a new Semantic Web Activity area This interview with Tim Berners-Lee gives a useful overview of the directions the W3C are taking:

		<blockquote>
			<p>
				There are also a lot of Members who have serious need for ontologies. There's a
				clearly understood need for ontologies in a large number of industries, and a ripe
				need for standardization, with things like <a href="http://www.ontoknowledge.org/oil/">OIL</a> and DARPA's
				<a href="http://www.daml.org/">DAML</a> effort. We're
				expecting ontology work to come into W3C as a Working Group quite soon.
			</p>
		</blockquote>