Spring Semester is here, and with it comes a reason to pick the blog back up off the floor, a class on Metadata. For those unfamiliar with the topic, metadata is commonly defined as simply being "data about data." Though the definition is lacking, the concept is not an easy one to describe. Metadata encompasses the various information that describes specific items or objects (often digital), such as: who created it, what format it is in, how many pages it has, physical dimensions, the title, and much more. Though metadata is not exclusive to digital formats and an online environment (our textbook suggests that information such as that found on the outside of grocery packaging can be considered metadata), that is often the medium in which we discuss it. For simplicity's sake, however, and for most of the purpose of my posts, let's consider metadata as the descriptive information about a digital object, such as a digital image or an mp3 file (this latter format I hope to explore much further in future posts).
I am grateful for the excuse to start posting again. I have a tendency to feel that, lacking anything significant, or scholarly, to say, there is nothing that I am able to contribute. Here's hoping that I can prove myself wrong.
Also, please feel free to follow me on Twitter @jdkeyes_1.
Your metadata definition is what is referred to more specifically as "descriptive metadata" (btw, this includes subject description unlike "descriptive cataloging" that doesn't ... oy!)
ReplyDeleteWe'll examine other types of metadata in this course, too, including preservation metadata, administrative metadata, and structural metadata....