Metadata and Tagging

What is Metadata?
 Metadata is ‘data about data’ or information about
information.
 Michael Day (Metadata in a Nutshell) defines
metadata as “standardised descriptive information
about resources, including non-digital ones.” (e.g.
book metadata, photograph metadata, etc.)

3 types of Metadata
1.

Descriptive Metadata (Human Level): “content about
the content” or metacontent.
 discovery and identification of resources.

1.

Structural Metadata (Machine Level): data about the
containers of data.

1.

Administrative Metadata (Human Level): information
for managing a resource.

Why create Metadata?
 Metadata makes your work readily available because:


Searchable: it‟s easy to find.



Authority: it‟s clear who created it.



Citation: it‟s easy for others to cite your work in their
publications.



Collaboration: it helps other people to build on your work
rather than having to recreate it.



Efficiency: you save time and money, if everyone creates
metadata.



Funding: you may be required to make your work readily
available to others.

What does Metadata do?
 Metadata is the key to ensuring the survival and
accessibility of resources into the future.
 Descriptive metadata facilitates the discovery of
relevant information.
 Resource discovery (e.g. library catalogs)
 Organize electronic resources
 Facilitate interoperability and resource integration
 Provide digital identification
 Support archiving and preservation

Interoperability
 Metadata is the key to interoperability.
 Interoperability is the ability of multiple systems with
different hardware and software platforms, data
structures and interfaces to exchange data with
minimal loss of content and functionality.
 Metadata promotes interoperability by making digital
information understandable to both humans and
machines.

Storing Metadata
 Metadata can be stored separately or embedded in a digital
object.
 Storing separately:




Can facilitate search and retrieval
Stored in database and linked to the object described.
E.g. Semantic web

 Storing metadata with object:





Ensures it wont be lost
Removes the problem of linking between data and metadata
Metadata and object are updated simultaneously
E.g. TEI

Digital Identification
 Metadata schemes include elements, such as
standard numbers, to uniquely identify the work or
object to which the metadata refers.
 Location of a digital object is given using:
 a file name
 URL (Uniform Resource Locator)
 PURL (Persistent URL)…… preferred!

 DOI (Digital Object Identifier)

Collaborative Metadata
 A tag is a non-hierarchical keyword or term assigned
to a piece of information (Wikipedia)
 Effectively, a tag is a form of metadata.

 O‟Shea (2013) describes 3 types of tagging :
1.

Personal

2.

Algorithmic

3.

Social

Hashtags
 A hashtag is a universal, standardised metadata
tag/mark.
 Therefore, #uccmadah is a form of descriptive
metadata.
 You choose your tags on
Twitter, Facebook, Wordpress, Youtube, etc.
 But, Youtube, Delicious, and Wordpress algorithms
also suggest tags for you.

HTML Metatags
 These are all located in the <head> tag.
 Example:
<head>
<meta name=“author” content=“Paul
O‟Shea”>
<meta name=“keywords” content=“metadata,
metacontent, HTML, etc….”>
<meta name=“description” content=“MA DAH
Powerpoint slides”>
</head>

teaching

Social Tagging
 Social tagging is also known as Folksonomies.
 Folksonomy originates from folk + taxonomy
 Taxonomy is the branch of science concerned with
systematic classifications.
 Ergo -> crowd-sourced tagging
 See plugins for MediaWiki/Ruby on Rails for example!

Geotagging
 The process of adding geo-spatially represented
metadata to various media and resources.
 Provides location-specific information

 Examples include:
 Digital cameras automatically geotag using GPS.
 Facebook and Twitter mobile apps allow you to geotag
tweets and status updates.

Archiving and
Preservation
 Special elements are required:
 To track the lineage of a digital object.
 Details of its physical characteristics.
 Document its behaviour for future technologies.

Composing Metadata
 Metadata schemes:
Sets of metadata elements designed for a specific
purpose, e.g. describing a particular type of information
resource.

•

If the resource lives on the internet then one may use
the URI to locate it and RDF to describe it.

Metadata Schemes
 Definition/meaning of the metadata elements are the
semantics of the scheme.
 Value given to the metadata elements are the content.

 Metadata schemes specify the names of elements
and their semantics, and also the syntax rules for how
elements and their content should be encoded.

The Dublin Core Metadata
Element Set
 Originated from 1995 workshop sponsored by OCLC
and NCSA
 Dublin, Ohio

 Common vocabulary, like FOAF (Friend of a Friend –
describing interpersonal networks)
 Important because it is endorsed by IETF and ISO

 See Euorpeana: http://www.europeana.eu/

The Dublin Core Metadata
Initiative (DCMI)
 Original objective:
 To define a set of elements that could be used by
authors to describe their own web resources.

 15 Elements:
 Title, Creator, Subject, Description, Publisher, Contribut
or, Date, Type, Format, Identifier, Source, Language, R
egion, Coverage and Rights.
 http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/

Dublin Core
 Designed to be simple and concise
 To describe Web based documents
 Minimalist view vs. Structuralist view (See Lumpers
and Splitters)
 Minimalists: minimum elements, simple semantics and
syntax

 Structuralist: Finer semantic distinctions and more
extensibility for particular communities.

Title=”Metadata Demystified”

Creator=”Brand, Amy”
Creator=”Daly, Frank”
Creator=”Meyers, Barbara”
Subject=”metadata”

Description=”Presents an overview of
metadata conventions in
publishing.”
Publisher=”NISO Press”

Publisher=”The Sheridan Press”
Date=”2003-07"
Type=”Text”
Format=”application/pdf”

Identifier=”http://www.niso.org/
standards/resources/
Metadata_Demystified.pdf”
Language=”en”

Dublin Core Example

Semantic Web
 Focuses on semantic content rather than plain text content.
 Allows for disambiguation of terms with the same
name, but different meanings.
 Evolved from limited, but simple, HTML meta tags to a
complex „web‟ of standards.
 Some of the well established standards are
Unicode, URI, XML, RDF, Web Ontology Language
(OWL), etc.
 Tim Berners-Lee
http://www.ted.com/talks/tim_berners_lee_on_the_next_we
b.html

TEI
 The Text Encoding Initiative http://www.tei-c.org/index.xml
 International project to develop guidelines for marking up
electronic texts such as
novels, plays, poetry, correspondence, etc.

 TEI Guidelines for Electronic Text Encoding and
Interchange
 Specify a header portion, embedded in the resource that
consists of metadata about the work.

 TEI Header can be used to record bibliographic information
about the digital edition.

Metadata and Tagging

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