Metadata
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Metadata Standards
Major Questions
- Why use metadata?
- What standards best suit our project's needs?
- How can we make this project interoperable?
Findings
In the case of the www.creatingholyoke.org project, agreeing on metadata was perhaps the most perplexing issue. Though I would suggest agreeing on which metadata to include before entering, I think there are always going to be adjustments while entering the metadata. Have a plan for the basic elements you will address, and then make all other metadata optional. Because we had more than one archive being combined to a digital collection, our metadata did not match each others. This limited our ability to combine metadata perfectly and we had to compromise. [Kate Thibodeau]
Standards and Best Practices Resources
(list from IMLS)
- Metadata Demystified (pdf) Amy Brand, Frank Daly, and Barbara Meyers (Sheridan Press and NISO Press, 2003).
- Data Standards and Guidelines Getty Standards and Digital Resource Management Program, Getty Research Institute
- Descriptive Metadata Guidelines for RLG Cultural Materials (pdf), by the OCLC Research Library Group.
- Best Practices for OAI Data Provider Implementations and Shareable Metadata, by the Digital Library Federation and the National Science Digital Library.
- Public Broadcasting Metadata Dictionary for public broadcasters’ television, radio, and Web activities.
- Digitization Guildelines collaborative effort by federal agencies formed as a group in 2007 to define common guidelines, methods, and practices to digitize historical content in a sustainable manner. Detailed information for still and moving image digitization.
- Library of Congress Digital Library Standards
- Digital Library Standards and Practices, Digital Library Federation
- Digital Toolbox for the Bibliographic Center for Research’s (BCR) Collaborative Digitization Program (CDP)
- Open Archives Initiative OAI-PMH and OAI-ORE
- Dublin Core Metadata Initiative
