I am following this discussion with great interest. I had already started thinking about some of these issues last year.
Claire Welsby makes really interesting points about scientific data.
All museums, however, could worry about the accuracy of the facts and provenance. Any museum might hold information in its databases that is changed or corrected in the future as research makes new discoveries, re-analyses what was known before. It would be helpful in a way if all data had an 'indelible' time-stamp that couldn't be separated from the facts.
In reality, we work with these fuzzy areas constantly, and always have done. In the old days, 30 years ago, they would have published information in print form that could be picked up and used in a text printed in another publication - probably without a correct (or even any) citation in a non-academic context. It happens faster and more widely than in print-only days, but I can't see that there is a substantial change because we now have digital media.
The issue of whether the information remains accurate is the problem of those re-using it in another context, not the institution that produces it originally.
I shall be interested to see what happens on the Culture Grid Hack Day (and, yes, I do have ideas :-)
Janet
Janet E Davis
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