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Palo Alto Online

Turning information into understanding

by Elizabeth Khuri

It is almost April, and while the sun shines outside, a perpetual thundercloud hangs over people's heads: 1040 forms await them at home on their desks, mixed in with other barely intelligible, tax-related documents. The language is such a jumble of provisos and technical language that, even if people possess the capability to understand it, they'd rather do anything than sit down for a couple of hours and try to decipher it.

Enter what one company hopes is an antidote to tax-time trepidation, software that aims to make complex language understandable. Log on to www.Upside.com, the Web site of Upside Financial Network, and users can find definitions and explanations of IRS terms at the click of a mouse. No more flipping through paper instructions and dog-earing pages, or worse yet, just guessing at the meanings.

Upside Financial Network is a client of a Palo Alto software company, Sentius, which created the click-and-read application called RichLink. The software enables Internet users to click on terms within a Web page and get a pop-up window with the definition. According to John Huber, a content editor for Sentius, RichLink is "an intelligent tool to make the Internet more comprehensive."

It all began in the early 1990's when Mark Bookman was working for Sony in Japan. He had a passable command of the Japanese language but continually found himself pouring over a dictionary while trying to read e-mail. Often, he found himself cross referencing texts to get an exact definition. Frustrated, he decided that it would be much more efficient if there were links for each word on the e-mail. Every time he needed to know the definition of a word or phrase, he could click on it and a pop up window with the definition would appear.

"He shopped the idea around to a lot of people, and they mentioned that you can use it in a lot more ways than just that," said Chris Verrill, whose title at Sentius is "Marketing Maestro." Bookman decided to develop the technology, license and patent it; he founded Sentius in 1993.

A publishing tool, RichLink is most commonly used with translation products. One customer is Asahi, a Japanese news site that publishes articles from English-language organizations, such as Reuters or Associated Press. Japanese residents who speaks some English, but have a limited vocabulary, may click on any word that is unfamiliar to them and a small pop-up window will appear with several definitions.

"One of the assets is that you don't have to leave the Web page for the information," said Verrill.

Another problem the software addresses, according to Huber, is that of globalization. By keeping documents in English, rather than translating them, they will retain their original meaning, he said. Sentius also markets RichLink to help businesses communicate information about their products. They've also programmed in a tiny survey into the software that their business clients "love," said Verrill. The mini-survey pops up on the Web site, and when filled out by visitors, provides companies with much-needed market information.

Sentius' clients include J-women, a Japanese Web site; Asahi; Apple Computer, which will begin the service in a month for the internal sales staff; the Wall Street Journal; and Seiko/Epson, which will use RichLink for their online patent-filing service. The company hopes to expand more in the financial and medical services markets.

Sentius' primary business is to enrich Web sites, using its software to embed a database into the client's Web site. The database of terms and explanations is either provided by Sentius or the client company. Sentius generates its revenue through annual or per-piece contracts with their clients. The contract is often structured around the number of documents enriched or the number of databases used. Sentius processes all the documents (Web pages) and then delivers the final product to the company.

"It takes a minute or less to do the document," said Verrill, whereas translation of documents could take at least a week or several days. Sentius' costs are also about a tenth of translators, who usually charge around 25 cents a word, Verrill said.

As for evidence that users benefit from the RichLink technology, Sentius conducted a survey in which they gave two groups a quiz on medical information. Both groups were allowed to use a medical Web site to locate the answers. One group's Web site had RichLink; the other's did not. The group that used Sentius' technology finished the quiz in 13.5 minutes on average while the other group spent 20.4 minutes.

"Its pretty compelling," said Huber, the content editor.

The financial pie is also expected to be significant. Verrill said that the electronic publishing industry is expected to be worth $4 billion over the next three or three years. And Sentius is hoping to get a piece of that action. <@$p>