In message <[log in to unmask]>, Paul Walk
<[log in to unmask]> writes
>
>Do we have a problem with broken links to open data? I don't see how
>if, as Jeremy says, very little data has been made openly linkable to
>date....
I'd agree: at this stage in the game I'm sure that's an entirely
rhetorical question. In the long run, however, trusting remote
identifiers is the only way that we can break out of our "data islands"
into any sort of wider web of information. That trust, and the
responsibility that goes with it, cuts both ways: it applies equally to
museum object identifiers and to the resources they will/should be
referencing, such as place name identifiers.
>The community *should* care about persistent identifiers - they are
>closely coupled with issues of preservation after all. But, based on
>experience in other sectors, this can also take ages to be implemented
>and adopted by the community. In fact, it hasn't always been adopted
>where one might have expected it to. It would be a shame to delay good
>efforts to link open data while we waited for this to become a reality.
I think I would put this the other way round: if museums don't get out
there and assert a unique identity for their objects, others will do it
for them/to them. This is already happening on dbPedia for the
scattering of museum objects mentioned there: the Mona Lisa is:
http://dbpedia.org/resource/Mona_Lisa
while the identifier:
http://dbpedia.org/resource/Bedroom_in_Arles
unhelpfully munges details of three different artworks.
Richard
--
Richard Light
XML/XSLT and Museum Information Consultancy
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