This leads in some interesting directions. Some of these, like the
nature of truth and accordingly how to determine whether a statement is
true, are in my view, beyond the ambition of the DCAM.
We are just modelling assertions about resources in our statements, not
aiming to expose the universal truth of those resources. However,
recognizing that these are only assertions does mean we need to consider
how their actual utility is assessed by end users.
Most of these assertions are contingent in some way - they are coloured
by the context within which the assertion is made. This contingency can
relate to the time the statement is made (rights statements are
particularly prone to change over time, unless carefully crafted), who
is making the statement and for what purpose (descriptions are
particularly variable in this way), and other changeable factors.
The changeability of statements (a statement that was 'true' when made
is no longer 'true' when surfaced) is only a particular aspect of this
contingency. And many people looking for information/resources do indeed
want/need to know about this stuff. Resource discovery (and use) is
about finding stuff that meets a need, and involves deciding which
statements you think are going to best reflect what it is that you
really need.
The whole discourse about trust in on-line settings plays in this space.
How do you come to trust an eBay vendors description? A review on
Amazon? The categorizations on one portal over another? Its all about
understanding the context in which the descriptive statements were made.
This has often been the point of departure for a discussion of
administrative metadata. Architecturally, though, it seems we are just
talking about related descriptions - descriptions of the metadata record
rather than the original target resource - which the webbiness of the
DCAM supports rather well.
John
-----Original Message-----
From: DCMI Architecture Forum [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Liddy Nevile
Sent: Saturday, 10 February 2007 10:05 a.m.
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [DCAM Public Comment] Monotonicity?
I think there are two aspects to this. First, the idea that you can say
a resource does or does not have an attribute and both of those
statements can be made explicitly, but also that you can identify who
and when that statement was made. In the accessibility world, this last
bit has been considered as of interest alongside the first because of
the legal implications, as well as the standard old trust one. EARL was
designed to manage the latter problem, and it is only RDF, so it could
be used, perhaps. For the former problem, there is the issue of the
vocab list being cumbersome.
I'd appreciate some guidance, for sure.
Liddy
On 09/02/2007, at 9:59 PM, Makx Dekkers wrote:
>
> Pete,
>
> Maybe you can explain this issue a bit further? I was following the
> discussion on DC-Accessibility as well but did not see a deeper issue
> other than a potential need to be able to say that a resource does
> NOT have a certain attribute.
>
> How are the deeper issues (the truth of statements and describing
> changes) related to that?
>
> Is this implying that the Dublin Core Abstract Model would break as a
> result of someone lying (deliberately or by accident) in the metadata?
> I hope not!
>
> Makx.
>
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: DCMI Architecture Forum
>> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Pete Johnston
>> Sent: Friday, February 09, 2007 11:16 AM
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: [DCAM Public Comment] Monotonicity?
>>
>> There's a long and rather complicated thread on the dc-accessibility
>> list at the moment which (essentially, I
>> think) circles around notions of how to "say" that a resource does
>> not have some attribute, and touches on broader notions of describing
>> changes in some attributes of a resource.
>>
>> Charles McCathieNevile makes the point here
>>
>> http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A2=ind0702&L=dc-acc
>> essibility
>> &P=2075
>>
>> that while this sort of thing can be represented using RDF and DCAM,
>> it does require some very careful modelling. I think generally this
>> area - that once a statement is made, it is expected to be true - is
>> something that we've tended to skirt over in DC generally, and I
>> wonder whether it merits a paragraph somewhere in the DCAM (though
>> I'm not volunteering to write it!)
>>
>> Pete
>> ---
>> Pete Johnston
>> Technical Researcher, Eduserv Foundation
>> Web: http://www.eduserv.org.uk/foundation/people/petejohnston/
>> Weblog: http://efoundations.typepad.com/efoundations/
>> Email: [log in to unmask]
>> Tel: +44 (0)1225 474323
>>
>>
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