I'd like to endorse the ideas that Allan outlines below. One of the major
shifts in focus that emerged from Frankfurt (the Frankfurt Focus?) is the
recognition that DCMI needs to broaden its scope to embrace
discipline-specific metadata, especially as we see the Dublin Core Metadata
Element Set reach a certain maturity.
DC-Education, DC-Library, and DC-Government are examples of this (the latter
two consituted in Frankfurt). The DCMI will be strengthened to the extent
that it attracts groups of committed experts who can apply the modular DCMI
approach to metadata to the resource description needs of their own
disciplines and articulate these needs in the form of complementary elements
that work effectively in a larger context of metadata. The disciplines in
turn will benefit from a coherent cross-disciplinary framework and a home
for the elements they judge essential to their needs.
A cautionary note. The success of this endeavor depends on the community of
expertise that can be attracted to the effort. The DCMI is a conceptual
framework supported largely by voluntary collaboration. The DCMI does not
have staff to solve the problems of a community, but rather can provide a
forum for the pursuit of such solutions.
Bring your energy and expertise.
stu
-----Original Message-----
From: Allan R Barclay [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 1999 2:21 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Call for medical/health SIG
Greetings everyone,
I'm rather new around here, but from what I can gather in recent
conversations there may be a niche for a medical/health related SIG
in the DCMI. I just wanted to get a feel for if people felt such a
SIG was warranted and, if so, who would want to participate. It seems
that in terms of subject matter most of the discussion here deals
with overarching schemes like LCSH or perhaps certain types of
resources like government documents. Often the tools developed for a
general audience don't work in specific disciplines like medicine, so
this SIG would address those sorts of interoperability issues as well
as giving people in the healthcare field a chance to work together
and perhaps learn more easily and quickly what DCMI is. I know that
the way we conduct business in a medical library can be rather
different than how it is conducted in a generalist library, so it
makes sense (to me, anyway) to have a separate SIG dealing with those
differences. The SIG could also address discipline specific issues
like patient records, interoperability with health databases, and
concepts like diagnosis, treatment, etc which don't really come up
elsewhere yet would be very important for any sort of medical
metadata scheme. Such a SIG might also be able to work with various
health organizations more effectively than the DCMI "at large".
Feel free to respond to me directly if you have any questions or wish
to tentatively participate. If there is sufficient interest I will
look into a more formal arrangement (i.e. mailing list, webpage, less
flaky leader, etc).
Take care,
Allan
________________________________________________________________________
Allan R Barclay Email: [log in to unmask]
Reference Librarian Voice: (317) 274-2254
Indiana University School of Medicine Fax: (317) 274-4056
Ruth Lilly Medical Library http://www.medlib.iupui.edu/hw/neuro/
975 W. Walnut St. IB 100 http://www.medlib.iupui.edu/students/
Indianapolis, IN 46202 http://www.medlib.iupui.edu/medcai/
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