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You could treat it as a blank node and then assign the label to that the same way you would if an identifier was present. Jeff > -----Original Message----- > From: DCMI Architecture Forum [mailto:[log in to unmask]] > On Behalf Of Karen Coyle > Sent: Thursday, June 21, 2012 8:13 PM > To: [log in to unmask] > Subject: Re: Limiting the use of string in DCAM design patterns > > Aaron, I was just today on another discussion where the "strings v. > things" came up. AS is so often the case, I think the answer here will > have to be: "it depends." > > Here's the use case that was discussed today: > > You are creating the metadata for a book. You may find a URI > representing the author, and perhaps the subject headings. But assume > that at the moment you have no idea if there is a URI for some other > element -- in our use case, the element was the name of a series. As a > practical matter, your choices are: > > 1) spend minutes or hours combing the web for a URI > 2) mint a URI for the series, which assumes a) that you have the > technology at hand to create a useful entity for the series and that b) > others will be able to resolve to it to find out if it is the same > series they are encountering in their metadata creation event > 3) give the name of series as a literal, hoping that in the future this > series will be well-defined and identified. > > I actually think that in many instances of metadata creation, #3 is the > only practical route to take, and the only one likely to be taken by > many because it has the least friction. By dis-allowing literals, you > may hinder the creation of metadata. (Undoubtedly this is what > motivated > schema.org, and is also what motivated DC at its origins.) > > The dilemma, in my mind, is how to manage this "either/or" -- either > strings or things -- in the DCAM model. > > kc > > > > On 6/21/12 11:33 AM, Aaron Rubinstein wrote: > > I was reading over the report from the 6/8 DCAM telecon and there was > one discussion in particular that struck me and I think might be worth > a bit more thought. > > > > Surrounding the discussion about the ISBD example and integrating > SESes into DCAM, Antoine made this statement: > > > > "Antoine: RDF is about encoding as little information in the string > as > > possible. That's why datatypes are not used much. I don't think DCAM > should > > have a different approach." > > > > Followed a little later with this from Karen: > > > > "Karen: In every case where you have multiple things, but the whole > can repeat. > > You can have multiple titles with multiple subtitles. A lot of this > stuff goes > > away when we use identifiers for things, but not all. A lot of what > we have > > should be replaced with URIs." > > > > I think both of these points are very interesting from the > perspective of how DCAM might contribute to a best practices for > metadata in use. We obviously need to consider the manipulation and > ultimately conversion of legacy data but I think we should also be > designing the DCAM toward a best practices approach as well. > > > > To that end, I'd be interested in hearing what others think about > attempting to limit a reliance on strings in our DCAM design patterns > in favor of URIs or other flavors of identifiers. > > > > FWIW, I am in agreement with Antoine here. > > > > Aaron > > > > -- > Karen Coyle > [log in to unmask] http://kcoyle.net > ph: 1-510-540-7596 > m: 1-510-435-8234 > skype: kcoylenet