Taguri.org Misinformation

I'm disappointed to see this misinformation on the taguri.org website:

[[[
Are all tag URIs also URNs? Can the meaning of a tag change?

That depends on what you mean by URN (Uniform Resource Name) and "meaning".
One sense of URN is that if you give a URN to some software, you should get
essentially the same behavior, regardless of who you are, where you are, or
when you do this. In that sense, tags are probably not URNs. Given a tag for
a can of beans, it would be completely appropriate for a handheld device to
tell you the price of the can when you're standing in a store and some
cooking instructions when you're standing in a kitchen.

Another sense of URNs is that they always "mean the same thing." Where
http://www.corinthians.com/ was once a site about the Bible, it is now
(following a WIPO decision) a site about a Brazilian sports team. We do not
expect tag URIs to ever undergo this kind of deep change of meaning, but we
do not know how to define constancy of meaning in the general case. Does
http://www.cnn.com change meaning every hour?
]]] - http://www.taguri.org/

I know we've discussed this several times, and I don't wish to open that can
of worms again, but this is plainly untrue. URNs have the same properties as
URIs in this respect, if not more so. Please correct the site.

Thanks,
-- 
      "Aaron Swartz"      |              The Semantic Web
 <mailto:me@aaronsw.com>  |  <http://logicerror.com/semanticWeb-long>
<http://www.aaronsw.com/> |        i'm working to make it happen

Received on Tuesday, 4 December 2001 20:42:20 UTC