- From: Sandro Hawke <sandro@w3.org>
- Date: Thu, 17 Nov 2011 14:26:42 -0500
- To: Phil Archer <phila@w3.org>
- Cc: Public GLD WG <public-gld-wg@w3.org>, "Ronald P. Reck" <rreck@rrecktek.com>
On Thu, 2011-11-17 at 16:54 +0000, Phil Archer wrote:
>
> Sandro has a proposal around things like namespace documents having a
> 'living will' - i.e. if the maintaining organisation ceases to exist
> or
> can no longer maintain a Web presence then some other organisation
> takes
> over.
I was advocating such a proposal to Phil, but I don't claim any
ownership of it. I've heard Dan Brickley and Tim Berners-Lee talk about
these issues from various angles over the years.
I'm not sure it's practical, but I really don't think anyone should be
publishing data in a vocabulary that they don't have reasonable
confidence will be around for as long as the data will be useful, ie
quite possibly forever. In order to enable publication, we should, I
think, vigorously promote vocabulary stability.
My strawman proposal would be:
- vocabularies should be given their own domain name, probably in .net
(they are infrastructure). this way full ownership as well as
maintenance duties can be transfered, legally, as necessary.
- there should be a two-level ownership structure, where one
disinterested, trusted, 3rd party (like the executor of a will) retains
final control, but delegates to the creator/maintainer. With written
policies about what happens in various eventualities. But, basically,
if either of these parties loses interest, they can be smoothly
replaced, and if the creator/maintainer ceases operation or stops acting
in good faith, it can be replaced.
-- Sandro
Received on Thursday, 17 November 2011 19:26:50 UTC