Stuart (S)
Re you comment on "course level being captured in a separate element as opposed to a qualifier of audience" -- I should clarify -- The metadata I was referring to is _local_ metadata which has been used here for processing URLs for many years -- It is not "a separate element as opposed to a qualifier of audience" per se -- it is in fact the only "audience-type" metadata which we have used to date. As I mentioned we are in the processes of changing all this.
With regards to the second issue -- I understand when you say that resources might well be considered to have been designed for "teaching students with ADD" but not actually _about_ "teaching students with ADD" -- To me these are in fact degrees of relevance on the same continuum, but nonetheless I will try to addresss them as seperate instances.
Ok so we're agreed that a resource _primarily_ concerned with "teaching students with ADD" would have such a notion expressed in "subject"
The second case: "Resources might well be designed for such a task that are
not "about" teaching students with ADD at all." Firstly on a semantic level - if something is "designed for such a task" then it seems to me that it's "about it", however I think I know what you're getting at. To me, it seems that if a resource is "designed for teaching students withh ADD" but not actually _about_ "teaching students with ADD" then that "design" is a quality of the resource itself - I for one would not like to be second-guessing the qualities/characteristics of a third-party's possibly intended audience. I would prefer to limit my description to qualities of the resource itself.
More precisely I experience a degree of discomfort with the notion of describing "audience traits" in general. To my mind prescriptive statements on the qualities or characteristics of an apparently "intented" audience where such qualities or characteristics are not held to be of ample significance to the resource that they are included in the "subject" are dangerous at worst and unhelpful at best.
Sorry to come across so strongly, but the idea of describing resources in terms
of their appropriateness to particular people exhibiting questionably measurable qualities and characteristics smack a little of value judgements.
i.e. is it really appropriate to prescribe different resources to individuals of different socio-economic status?
Perhaps I'm missing something here (or have joined the discussion too late) but the following "audience traits" which were the result of earlier discussion seem very questionable to me.
1. Intelligence/ability
2. Physical/emotional characteristics
3. Socio-economic status
4. Cultural/linguistic groups
5. Gender
I'm hoping I've outlined my objections clearly enough -- I'm pretty sure it's clear that I am having trouble with this :) -- I'd really appreciate plenty of feedback -- as I said at the top, we are currently addressing a new metadata implementation and I certainly want it to be as condusive as possible to resource sharing.
Regards
Stuart Mitchell
Schoolsnet Australia
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Stuart Sutton <[log in to unmask]> on Mon, 27 Mar 2000 05:52:04 -0800 wrote:
> Stuart (M), I am not wed to information regarding course level
> being captured in a separate element as opposed to a qualifier
> of audience (where I think it just as naturally might reside).
> However, I do want to take issue with capturing information
> such as "teaching students with ADD" in the subject element.
> I think that would be the case if the resource were actually
> "about" teaching students with ADD but not otherwise.
> Resources might well be designed for such a task that are
> not "about" teaching students with ADD at all. In such cases,
> it should _not_ be captured in the subject element.
>
> Stuart (S)
>
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> Stuart A. Sutton (206) 685-6618 (V)
> University of Washington (206) 616-3152 (F)
> School of Library and Information Science
> Box 352930
> Seattle, WA 98195-2930 [log in to unmask]
> GEM http://geminfo.org (Project)
> http://www.TheGateway.org
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In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. But in practice there is.
- Jan L.A. van de Snepscheut
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