Graph Chat with Jessica Talisman, Founder of the Ontology Pipeline
Why is modern AI – particularly LLMs – so unruly?
According to information architect and Librarian of All Knowledge Jessica Talisman, it’s because we’ve over-indexed on data storage and ignored the art of description.
In other words, without arranging and describing data using an intentional organized approach (i.e., an ontology, taxonomy, etc.) and without marking relationships between different data points (i.e., connected graph data) a human – much less an AI – can’t make any meaning of the data. It doesn’t matter how much what data you have, if you don’t have any why data.
The secret to determining why? The answer is found in library science.
In this Graph Chat video series for GraphGeeks, I interviewed Jessica Talisman, the Founder of the Ontology Pipeline (and more) at ODSC West in San Francisco. Catch our convo below!
Graph Chat Interview with Jessica Talisman on Semantic Technology & the Power of Librarians
Jessica Talisman’s experience with information architecture and semantic tech has spanned decades, with experience across government, corporate, and academic spaces, with her most recent position being at Adobe. Now, Jessica works as an indy consultant, author, and Founder of the Ontology Pipeline.
In this Graph Chat, Jessica discusses the bridge between labeled property graphs (LPG) and RDF, the hype around context engineering, the rise of neuro-symbolic AI, and why every tech company needs the perspective of a “Chief Librarian.” Her hot take on AI: The real innovation coming out of AI is integrations. 😏
Check out Jessica’s Substack Intentional Arrangement for her expert perspectives on the breadth of the semantic technology spectrum, including data quality, data cleaning, controlled vocabularies, taxonomies, thesauri, ontologies, and knowledge graphs – and the synthesis of all those working together.
More about the Ontology Pipeline
The Ontology Pipeline is a framework for building semantic knowledge graphs and the organization to help you make it happen. Jessica and her team help your business distill your data into information to form knowledge – helping humans and machines connect and understand one another.
The Ontology Pipeline teaches companies, teams, and individuals on how to upskill their talent in order to build and scale semantic knowledge infrastructure.
Need an IDE to help you work with your LPG or RDF data? Check out G.V() – a graph IDE with a free tier for developers and a generous free trial for bigger projects – and level up your connected data game today.
Subscribe for More Graph Chats
The Graph Chat video series by GraphGeeks aims to ask diverse leaders and practitioners about where the future of graph technology is headed. This and other episodes were sponsored by gdotv – the graph database IDE. Check out the full playlist of Graph Chats for more!
Special thanks to Michelle Yi (Cinematographer), Amy Hodler (Studio Exec, Producer), and Bryce Merkl Sasaki (On-Screen Talent, Giant Person).
If you enjoyed this Graph Chat interview with Jessica Talisman, subscribe to the GraphGeeks YouTube channel for more great discussions with leaders across the graph technology space.
Ready to level up your graph game? Try out gdotv today and query, edit, track, and visualize your connected data like never before.
![Cypher MATCH Clause: Finding Nodes & Relationships in Your Graph [Byte-Sized Cypher Series]](https://gdotv.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/match-clause-byte-sized-cypher-query-langauge-video-series.jpg "Cypher MATCH Clause: Finding Nodes & Relationships in Your Graph [Byte-Sized Cypher Series]")
![The Weekly Edge: Hyper/Knowledge Graphs, Advanced Neo4j Spatial, Hot Takes from Texas, & More [30 January 2026]](https://gdotv.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/data-day-texas-neptune-analytics-neo4j-spatial-weekly-edge-30-january-2026.png "The Weekly Edge: Hyper/Knowledge Graphs, Advanced Neo4j Spatial, Hot Takes from Texas, & More [30 January 2026]")