Re: Toy proposal

> On 17 Apr 2015, at 12:22, Wallis,Richard <Richard.Wallis@oclc.org> wrote:
> 
> On 17 Apr 2015, at 11:59, Owen Stephens <owen@ostephens.com <mailto:owen@ostephens.com>> wrote:
> 
>> If there are no properties assigned to the type I struggle to see the need for the type given the agreed convention for assigning product types.
> 
> There is a subtle difference between a particular a Product - lawnmower, vacuum cleaner, car - and a type/category of product - toy lawnmower, toy vacuum cleaner, toy car.

So subtle I’m missing it :) Can you say what differentiation you are making?
A toy lawnmower is not a lawnmower any more than a toy dog is a dog. I don’t think it would be appropriate to assign ‘dog’ as an additionalType to a Toy whichever way you slice it.

> 
> 
>> I’d suggest that ‘ageRange’ is a more general property and not something solely related to Toys.
> Totally agree, I would if proposing this suggest extending the range of typicalAgeRange <https://schema.org/typicalAgeRange> to include the Toy type.

OK - I think this is the first concrete purpose for a Toy type in the discussion
Here my knowledge of how Extensions would work falls down - can we add properties to existing Schema.org types through an Extension, or do we have to have a new Type in the Extension to do this?

If the former, then I’d propose typicalAgeRange should be added to Product not Toy
If the latter it is clearly more problematic, but I’d go for something more general that Toy I think

> 
>> 
>> What benefit do you see having a ‘Toy’ type with no properties conferring?
> 
> It is a pattern used elsewhere in Schema.org <http://schema.org/> indicating a more specific type of thing than the parent - for example Landform <https://schema.org/Landform> is a specific type of Place but has currently no extra properties.  Not justification in itself I know.  A Toy is just a Product, of many possible forms, satisfying play needs, as against a product of any old type.
> 
I agree it isn’t a justification :)
So far I’m still a bit baffled why you want to do this via an Extension rather than using markup such as I previously proposed

Owen