Re: Proposal for an 'Archive' Type

Both Ethan and Stian raise good points here.

Many archives, along with the rest of the GLAM community of organizations,
are cultural heritage organizations operated by government, local &
national, or not for profit NGOs - but not all fall within those
boundaries.  Some are commercial, or part of commercial, organizations.
Many do not open to the public, but many do.

An archive *does not* have to be physical, yet the organization that hosts
it, which is what we are discussing here, most likely does have a physical
presence:

>From Archive.org: *please contact the Archive at info@archive.org
<info@archive.org> or Internet Archive, 300 Funston Ave., San Francisco, CA
94118, phone 415-561-6767 <415-561-6767>.*

Zenodo: *Address European Organization for Nuclear Research, CH-1211
CERN, Genève 23, Switzerland.*


We have a matrix of organization types (commercial, government, not for
profit, cultural heritage, etc) and physical presence, or not, and
organizations as disparate as a local branch library/archive,
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/, http://zenodo.org, to represent.

Whatever compromise we come up with, it will feel not quite right to
someone in our community.

How we proceed towards a consensus is greatly influenced by Schema.org, the
vocabulary we are [hopefully] proposing to extend, its style and purpose.

Schema is a general purpose vocabulary for describing things on the web - to
make those descriptions more readily understandable and discoverable in the
wider world, leading to them being more discoverable.  This has led to 600+
types and 900+ properties being available where appropriate to describe
your resources.  This has resulted in defined Types inheriting properties
from super types that seem a little anomalous. An oft quoted example being
the Volcano Type inheriting faxNumber from Place.  When you look at the
documentation, that property does not make much sense when narrowly
defining a particular volcano. However it is only there as a potential term
- if your volcano does not have a fax, you don't need to use it.

If we do create Archive as a subtype of LocalBusiness, users of the
vocabulary to describe their archive organization will be presented with a
collection of properties to use if and where appropriate.  If
their organization has opening hours, that will define them. If they do not
open to the public they will not. The same for address, etc.

The semantic inferences of Type names and their descriptions is obviously
important as we build our proposals and I am fully in favour of proposing
enhancements to the description of the LocalBusiness Type to make it
less commercially focused - for the benefit of the whole vocabulary not
just for archives.

We also have to consider the established use of the vocabulary
(LocalBusiness for example is already in use on between 500,000 - 1,000,000
domains) and the benefits for description and discovery in introducing new
types, especially super types, such as CollectingOrganisation, into the
vocabulary.

Pragmatically, I believe we have an excellent chance of getting a proposal
to enhance the description of LocalBusiness accepted. Equally I believe we
will have great difficulty in justifying a proposal for a new super-type
that will mostly duplicate LocalBusiness.

I am hoping where this group can add the most benefit and value is in
describing the actual archives, these organizations hold and manage, and
what they contain.

~Richard


Richard Wallis
Founder, Data Liberate
http://dataliberate.com
Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/richardwallis
Twitter: @rjw

On 30 July 2015 at 10:05, Stian Soiland-Reyes <
soiland-reyes@cs.manchester.ac.uk> wrote:

> -1 to  say an Archive is a kind of LocalBusiness.
>
>
> In the description:
>
> > A particular physical business or branch of an organization. Examples of
> LocalBusiness include a restaurant, a particular branch of a restaurant
> chain, a branch of a bank, a medical practice, a club, a bowling alley, etc.
>
> If anything, the name "LocalBusiness" is what is wrong. This just
> means an physical presence of an organization, like a shop, branch,
> office, venue - but in particular that is somewhat open for consumers
> (opening hours and payment options).
>
> This explanation still makes sense for a regular Library (even if it's
> not a Business), but not for say Pentagon, and I would argue not for
> many kinds of Archives.
>
>
> Does an Archive have to be physical? So https://archive.org/ and
> http://zenodo.org/ doesn't count - none of the LocalBusiness
> properties make sense there.
>
> I thought we were particularly also supporting digital archives here.
>
>
> Physical archives like the Svalbard Global Seed Vault has as a main
> feature that it is *not* open nor accessible and I don't see why this
> should come up as a LocalBusiness in Svalbard.
>
>
>
> On 28 July 2015 at 12:25, Richard Wallis
> <richard.wallis@dataliberate.com> wrote:
> > Hi Ingrid,
> >
> > Thoughts inline below
> >
> > ~Richard
> > On 28 July 2015 at 01:40, Ingrid Mason <ingrid.b.mason@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> Kaching!
> >>
> >> My 2c (apologies upfront, I wasn't in the discussion at LODLAM in case
> >> this got worked over) and I'm looking at Schema.org for the first time
> >> properly.  Feel free to point me to some background reading and to
> resist
> >> opining.
> >
> >
> > Best place to start is Schema.org  and the FAQ.  You will see from these
> > that Schema.org is a general purpose vocabulary (currently of 600+ Types
> and
> > 900+ properties) for describing things on the web - I would add the
> implicit
> > 'so they can be discovered'.  These aims - describing things and for
> > discovery - result in a certain uncomfortable reaction for those new to
> it.
> > Such as books having a name not a title, Volcano having the ability to
> > define a faxNumber, and your concerns about LocalBusiness.
> >
> >>
> >> But.. I am having a reaction to the suggestion that an archive or
> library
> >> operates as a subclass of LocalBusiness.
> >
> >
> > Do not read too much into type name of LocalBusiness.  It is just a
> useful
> > way to combine the properties from Place and Organization plus
> openingHours
> > (see this pre-release view of Library which shows the type inheritance
> > better)
> >
> >>
> >> What's the purpose here?  To share information about the GLAM group
> entity
> >> or its collection/archival material or both?  I'm wagering both and that
> >> they need to be treated separately.
> >>
> >>
> >> Archives (as group entity) sit within diverse organisation types.
> >> Archives (as material that emerges from activities).
> >>
> >> Same goes for libraries and library collections.
> >
> > The purpose of the potential archive.schema.org extension is to share
> > information about:
> >
> > An archive organization with a physical/virtual presence (address,
> > parentOrganization, department(s), openingHours etc.)
> >
> > Organizations such as The National Archives
> > Organizations of all types - commercial, not for profit, government, etc.
> > Organizations could add this to their other descriptive types e.g. An
> > organization could be a Library AND an Archive
> >
> > An archive - an archived collection of things
> >
> > Ownership/responsibility not necessarily associated with an organization
> > that declares itself an Archive.
> >
> > Things within an archive
> >
> > Including but not restricted to creative work
> >
> > This discussion thread is focussed on the first of these.
> >>
> >>
> >> Could not a CollectingOrganisation entity be a type of Organisation?
> >
> >
> > It could be, but I'm not sure what extra value/properties would be
> gained by
> > this move - we would still need to add in most of what comes from
> > LocalBusiness.
> >
> >>
> >>
> >> Rather than CreativeWork, perhaps HeritageObject or something equally
> >> stretchy to encompass diverse GLAM collection materials.
> >
> >
> > This will be the subject of another, I expect long, thread about what is
> > unique about things in an archive that we want to share and help make
> them
> > discoverable.
> >
> >>
> >>
> >> Ingrid (Canberra)
> >>
> >> *GLAM being galleries, libraries, archives, museums
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On 28 July 2015 at 09:24, Mark A. Matienzo <mark.matienzo@gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> Hi Richard, all -
> >>>
> >>> As noted on my comments the proposal on Github [0], I'm in favor of
> this
> >>> proposal. I also made a suggestion that we defer to the ICA-ISDIAH [1]
> >>> definition (i.e., an "archive" in this sense as an institution with
> >>> "archival holdings," rather than the stuff itself).
> >>>
> >>> [0]
> >>>
> https://github.com/schemaorg/schemaorg/issues/628#issuecomment-125371578
> >>> [1] http://www.ica.org/10198/standards/isdiah
> >>>
> >>> --
> >>> Mark A. Matienzo <mark@matienzo.org> | http://anarchivi.st/
> >>>
> >>> On Mon, Jul 27, 2015 at 2:45 PM, Richard Wallis
> >>> <richard.wallis@dataliberate.com> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>> Hi Karen,
> >>>>
> >>>> Singular / plural term names have been a discussion since the early
> days
> >>>> of Schema.org that eventually settled in favor of singular.
> >>>>
> >>>> Yes, what is/isn't a creative work is definitely the subject for
> another
> >>>> discussion, which we should start soon.
> >>>>
> >>>> ~Richard
> >>>>
> >>>> Richard Wallis
> >>>> Founder, Data Liberate
> >>>> http://dataliberate.com
> >>>> Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/richardwallis
> >>>> Twitter: @rjw
> >>>>
> >>>> On 27 July 2015 at 19:22, GRACY, KAREN F <kgracy@kent.edu> wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>> I would be in support of adding Archive as a new subclass under
> >>>>> schema:LocalBusiness.  There is the question of whether we should
> use the
> >>>>> singular or pluralized version of the word (archive and archives are
> often
> >>>>> used interchangeably).  The Glossary of Archival Records and
> Terminology
> >>>>> (published by the Society of American Archivists) provides entries
> on each
> >>>>> version (see http://www2.archivists.org/glossary/terms/a/archive and
> >>>>> http://www2.archivists.org/glossary/terms/a/archives for Glossary
> >>>>> definitions).
> >>>>>
> >>>>> In my estimation, the more serious concern might be with classifying
> >>>>> archival documents as Creative Works (but I will save my comments
> for that
> >>>>> conversation!).
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Karen
> >>>>>
> >>>>> ***********************************************************
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Karen F. Gracy
> >>>>> Associate Professor
> >>>>> School of Library and Information Science
> >>>>> Kent State University
> >>>>> kgracy@kent.edu
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> On Jul 27, 2015, at 8:02 AM, Richard Wallis
> >>>>> <richard.wallis@dataliberate.com> wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>> This is the first of a few conversations we need to start in building
> >>>>> towards some consensus around proposals.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Prior to the setting up of this group Dan Scott proposed a new
> >>>>> Schema.org type 'Archive':
> >>>>>
> >>>>> In preparing to attend the LODLAM Summit 2015 (Linked Open Data for
> >>>>> Libraries, Archives, and Museums), it is glaringly evident that we
> are
> >>>>> missing a class to represent archives.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> The simplest possible place to start would be to parallel
> >>>>> schema:Library by subclassing schema:LocalBusiness with a definition
> such as
> >>>>> "An entity that collects documents and records related to the
> activities of
> >>>>> people or organizations."
> >>>>>
> >>>>> This would enable us to describe archives as a specific class of
> >>>>> LocalBusiness with schema.org, rather than having to use
> LocalBusiness
> >>>>> directly.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> This raised comments regarding the too commercial nature of the
> >>>>> LocalBusiness definition, which could be enhanced to include
> something along
> >>>>> lines that "businesses may also be not-for-profit or state-owned."
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Are we happy to take on that proposal - do we have comments?
> >>>>>
> >>>>> ~Richard
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Richard Wallis
> >>>>> Founder, Data Liberate
> >>>>> http://dataliberate.com
> >>>>> Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/richardwallis
> >>>>> Twitter: @rjw
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>
> >>>
> >>
> >
>
>
>
> --
> Stian Soiland-Reyes, eScience Lab
> School of Computer Science
> The University of Manchester
> http://soiland-reyes.com/stian/work/
> http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9842-9718
>