Hi Thad, thank you for your very helpful answer and great advice. I would prefer not to use “interested in”, because that is often different from “having a skill” (though there certainly is some statistical correlation). I am interested in art, but have absolutely no skill in drawing. On the other hand, I have substantial skill in doing tax declarations, but absolutely no interest. I understand that Wikidata aims to capture facts that can – or could - be verified by external sources. Therefore, skills are only relevant for Wikidata if they are certified by an institution. However, “interested in” seems even more subjective and difficult to verify. Best wishes, Cord Von: Wikidata [mailto:wikidata-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] Im Auftrag von Thad Guidry Gesendet: Freitag, 9. Oktober 2020 21:41 An: Discussion list for the Wikidata project &lt;wikidata(a)lists.wikimedia.org&gt; Betreff: Re: [Wikidata] Property to encode the skills of a person Hi Cord, We do not have such a property for various reasons but historically because of fear of extra vandalism (which I don't completely agree with), difficulty with adding references to support the statement claims (I agree that's hard and why certified_as is being discussed below and why P4968 was added to help), and other reasons. I would suggest to look at the following Property proposals: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Property_proposal/certified_as https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Property_proposal/ESCO_Skill as well as: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P4968 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P1576 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P101 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P106 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P8258 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P2650 I think your closest ally to help with an immediate problem would be to reframe it as "this person -> interested in P2650<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P2650> -> food toxicology" with the idea that they not only interested but also skilled or specialized in some field of study or area of research" It's about the best you can do for now...but perhaps the other listed properties above help you more depending on the context. For instance, a prominent notable professor or researcher can be said to be "skilled" in "ancient history" but it is more likely their "field of work" or "field of training" is in "ancient history". For languages, you can already use languages spoken, written or signed P1412<https://www.wikidata.org/entity/P1412> and native language P103<http://native%20language%20P103> It's always best to look at the properties for this type P1963<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P1963> on any particular entity type, such as looking and scrolling down on Q5 human<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5> or Q901 scientist<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q901> which already lists many of those properties above. Whatever is in properties for this type<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P1963> is further used as a dropdown statement hint and its based on if you apply a instance of<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P31> statement and fill in a more specific type for a person, like saying this person is an instance of chess player<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q10873124>24>, or scientist<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q901>01>, or politician<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q82955>55>. Thad https://www.linkedin.com/in/thadguidry/ On Fri, Oct 9, 2020 at 12:59 PM Wiljes, Cord <cord.wiljes@uni-bielefeld.de<mailto:cord.wiljes@uni-bielefeld.de>> wrote: Dear Wikidata community, I am looking for a property to encode the skills (or expertise) that a person has, e.g. “C programming”, “ancient history”, “French”, “Ballroom dancing”. At best, it should be possible to add a qualifier for the skill level, e.g. “beginner”, “advanced”, “expert”. I have been looking for such a property on the properties page (https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:List_of_properties) but could not find one. Maybe there is a more general solution - like using “significant person” qualified by “object has role” + “friend” to denote “hasFriend”? Best wishes, Cord ----- Cord Wiljes https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/User:Wiljes _______________________________________________ Wikidata mailing list Wikidata@lists.wikimedia.org<mailto:Wikidata@lists.wikimedia.org> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikidata

Interesting I guess we should somehow coordinate what we do in this area with Skills and occupation codes... I had a meeting yesterday (see T264852<https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T264852>) with a Swedish organization Jobtech<https://jobtechdev.se/en/> and I presented Wikidata to see if it could add value,.... Jobtech is an inititive were the Swedish Public employement service<https://arbetsformedlingen.se/other-languages/english-engelska> and other organisationis looking into building a data driven platform that should help match people looking for work and employees looking for skills Jobtech has there own Taxonomy<https://jobtechdev.se/en/docs/apis/taxonomy/> and I will look into if Wikidata can add value to them and/or creating Wikidata property for Jobtech As Thad point out there are already some properties for skills and I added last week the Swedish one for occupation codes SSYK Property:P8654<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P8654> Anyone with thoughts in this area please contact me I can see that a global employee market can gain from describing skills and occupations and education with linked data and maybe Wikidata can be part of this ... Regards Magnus Sälgö Stockholm, Sweden User: salgo60<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/User:Salgo60> Linked in<https://www.linkedin.com/in/magnus-s%C3%A4lg%C3%B6-148890/> ________________________________ From: Wikidata &lt;wikidata-bounces(a)lists.wikimedia.org&gt; on behalf of Wiljes, Cord &lt;cord.wiljes(a)uni-bielefeld.de&gt; Sent: Saturday, October 10, 2020 12:07 AM To: Discussion list for the Wikidata project &lt;wikidata(a)lists.wikimedia.org&gt; Subject: Re: [Wikidata] Property to encode the skills of a person Hi Thad, thank you for your very helpful answer and great advice. I would prefer not to use “interested in”, because that is often different from “having a skill” (though there certainly is some statistical correlation). I am interested in art, but have absolutely no skill in drawing. On the other hand, I have substantial skill in doing tax declarations, but absolutely no interest. I understand that Wikidata aims to capture facts that can – or could - be verified by external sources. Therefore, skills are only relevant for Wikidata if they are certified by an institution. However, “interested in” seems even more subjective and difficult to verify. Best wishes, Cord Von: Wikidata [mailto:wikidata-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] Im Auftrag von Thad Guidry Gesendet: Freitag, 9. Oktober 2020 21:41 An: Discussion list for the Wikidata project &lt;wikidata(a)lists.wikimedia.org&gt; Betreff: Re: [Wikidata] Property to encode the skills of a person Hi Cord, We do not have such a property for various reasons but historically because of fear of extra vandalism (which I don't completely agree with), difficulty with adding references to support the statement claims (I agree that's hard and why certified_as is being discussed below and why P4968 was added to help), and other reasons. I would suggest to look at the following Property proposals: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Property_proposal/certified_as https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Property_proposal/ESCO_Skill as well as: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P4968 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P1576 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P101 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P106 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P8258 https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P2650 I think your closest ally to help with an immediate problem would be to reframe it as "this person -> interested in P2650<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P2650> -> food toxicology" with the idea that they not only interested but also skilled or specialized in some field of study or area of research" It's about the best you can do for now...but perhaps the other listed properties above help you more depending on the context. For instance, a prominent notable professor or researcher can be said to be "skilled" in "ancient history" but it is more likely their "field of work" or "field of training" is in "ancient history". For languages, you can already use languages spoken, written or signed P1412<https://www.wikidata.org/entity/P1412> and native language P103<http://native%20language%20P103> It's always best to look at the properties for this type P1963<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P1963> on any particular entity type, such as looking and scrolling down on Q5 human<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5> or Q901 scientist<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q901> which already lists many of those properties above. Whatever is in properties for this type<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P1963> is further used as a dropdown statement hint and its based on if you apply a instance of<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property:P31> statement and fill in a more specific type for a person, like saying this person is an instance of chess player<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q10873124>24>, or scientist<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q901>01>, or politician<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q82955>55>. Thad https://www.linkedin.com/in/thadguidry/ On Fri, Oct 9, 2020 at 12:59 PM Wiljes, Cord <cord.wiljes@uni-bielefeld.de<mailto:cord.wiljes@uni-bielefeld.de>> wrote: Dear Wikidata community, I am looking for a property to encode the skills (or expertise) that a person has, e.g. “C programming”, “ancient history”, “French”, “Ballroom dancing”. At best, it should be possible to add a qualifier for the skill level, e.g. “beginner”, “advanced”, “expert”. I have been looking for such a property on the properties page (https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:List_of_properties) but could not find one. Maybe there is a more general solution - like using “significant person” qualified by “object has role” + “friend” to denote “hasFriend”? Best wishes, Cord ----- Cord Wiljes https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/User:Wiljes _______________________________________________ Wikidata mailing list Wikidata@lists.wikimedia.org<mailto:Wikidata@lists.wikimedia.org> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikidata

Hi Jan! Yes, you are right (my example was bad regarding P31 instance of; I should have found a better example). But I think Cord understood the idea I was trying to explain. Your warning of using P31 correctly stems from the current constraints on P31, which are fairly clear, here's a few of them: Multiple P31 claims lead to duplicate tuples Avoid P31 of P279 of Q5 (P106 or other properties should be created) Can't be instance of both human and occupation and tons of other usage and constraint rules on P31 <https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Property_talk:P31> to help keep things tidy and clean in Wikidata. Thad https://www.linkedin.com/in/thadguidry/ On Fri, Oct 9, 2020 at 5:43 PM Jan Ainali &lt;ainali.jan(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: