Re: schema.org and libraries

Hi

On 8 June 2011 18:00, Bernhard Haslhofer <bernhard.haslhofer@cornell.edu> wrote:

> I guess many of you already know that Google, Bing and Yahoo announced http://schema.org/ - a kind of "Ueberschema" for structured data on the Web. I have been following this mailing list for a while and was wondering that this - I would say quite relevant development - has not been discussed yet. I am just curious to hear what library people think about it so I formulated some questions that came into my mind:

I've been talking to a bunch of people about it this week. In general
despite the fuss, I see schema.org as important, and as progress. The
biggest problem right now is not that they adopt Microdata notation,
but the language on the site suggesting that RDFa should not also be
used in case it conflicts and confuses parsers. I have some hope they
can be persuaded to consume RDFa 1.1 too, but time will tell.

> 1.) Should libraries start describing their objects using the schema.org vocabulary or can they safely ignore that development?

The schema is worth some attention. I wouldn't race to deploy it or
rewrite current plans (esp re Microdata vs RDFa) but it's certainly
worth thinking about where the linkages are between LLD-style metadata
and this stuff. The schema dives quite deeply into some areas that we
address only via subject classification (like consumer products and
services, local businesses) while treating others fairly
superficially. Some careful and calm comparisons would benefit
everyone.

> 2.) Many libraries already expose their data as Linked Data. Is it necessary to align these developments with schema.org?

Nobody should get upset or worried fearing wasted effort. This is the
search engines putting a 'toe in the water'. It is probably a good
time though to have a nice accessible summary of what's going on in
the Library / Linked Data world (and archives, museums and nearby) for
those folk in the search world who don't follow things very closely.
Maybe the XG's final report will help here? How's the draft looking?

> 3.) Are there already any plans of using the schema.org extension mechanism (http://schema.org/docs/extension.html) for library vocabularies?

Too soon to tell how well this extension mechanism will work, but
identifying bridges between schema.org class/property structures, and
the vocabs developed and used around here would really help. How those
links are expressed is another matter.

> 4.) schema.org seems to follow so kind of "evolutionary" schema development approach: "Extensions that gain significant adoption on the web may be moved into the core schema.org vocabulary, so that search engines can provide more functionality based on better understanding of the structured data." If schema.org is relevant for libraries, how does this affect current and future developments of library vocabularies such as FRBR, RDA, etc.?

The main connection point will be sites that publish this stuff in the
public Web. Vocabularies that are used only in closed systems won't be
so affected. So the various one-page-per-book efforts (open library,
bibliographica etc) might become useful practical focus for discussion
on improving and linking schemas...

> I would be happy to hear opinions on that. I will try to summarize them later...

All imho :)

cheers,

Dan


> Thanks,
>
> Bernhard
>
> _____________________
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> Bernhard Haslhofer
> Postdoctoral Associate
> Cornell Information Science
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> Phone: +1-607-379-0831
> Skype: bernhard.haslhofer
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Received on Wednesday, 8 June 2011 17:37:04 UTC