Meditations/Metadata in an
Emergency
DAVID BANUSH
ANN CALDWELL
NELINET
MAY 27, 2009

I am needed by things as the sky must be above the earth.
--Frank O’Hara, “Meditations in an Emergency”

Emergencies
•Economic
•Competition
•Demographic

Questions
•What are the questions we need to ask?
•What evidence do we have to guide us?
•How can we make use of “more product, less
process” and still meet the needs of users?

Questions
•Does metadata really matter?
• Low cost/high utility?
• E-texts, computational analysis, “ambient
findability”
• What is the return on investment?

Questions
•Where are we as a community?

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Questions
•Where are we as a community?
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• Resistance to core
• LC series decision

Questions
•Where are we as a community?
• CONSER standard record (and
BIBCO)
• Archives (Green/Meisner report)
• RDA core elements

It's like a final chapter no one reads because the plot is
over.
--Frank O’Hara, “Meditations in an Emergency”

What I’ve learned in the last 30
years

What from MARC cataloging is applicable to digital
metadata?
We’re well-prepared to create metadata
We may be too well-prepared

What can we learn from metadata for digital
projects?

Group approach

Anyone can create metadata

Standards
Apply?
Don’t apply?
Which ones?
What difference will it make?

Define a minimal level record

Authority control?
Who?
What?
When?
Where?
Why?

Subject analysis
Might be useful
Might not be
Will definitely be a lot of work

If you say “keyword” once more I’ll
smack you!

Would you like a genre with that?

Abstracts
We LOVE abstracts!
Just one short abstract

What you see is what you get

Tools
Be lazy
Macros
Friendly tools

Advice
Don’t sweat the small stuff
What’s important, what’s not?
Where can you compromise?

RELAX AND ENJOY YOURSELF!