Custom «Metadata Strategy Development» Essay Paper Sample

1.0 Introduction

1.1 Background of the Study

In today’s world, the need for information and services has been centred on web browsing and computers. Web browsing allows people to have unlimited access to information, entertainment and possibilities of business. Almost every industry has generated an interest in the information technology industry (Zeng, 2007). For any business or industry to attain its optimization mark in use of resources for market penetration, or sell goods and services, it has to have quality knowledge and use of computers and the web. The element of importance in marketing most important is presentation and ease of accessibility of goods and services. Of particular interest to this report is the entertainment industry that has evolved into the digital era from the era which involved motion pictures, thus increasing the need to ease accessibility of videos from the web (Quanzhong, 2003).

In recent times, it has become possible for videos to be produced digitally and for films that were produced before the digital age to be converted into digital formats. Remarkable progress has also been made in their collection, accessibility and manageability. The information for a film is, however, too large and can take up a lot of space. This has been addressed by the invention that involved creating metadata which enabled to reduce the storage space and accessibility (Palgrave Macmillan Journals, 2010). This report will show that it is important to come up with metadata for a collection of films. Furthermore, it identifies the requirements for metadata to access and form a video to be digitally stored on the web. It will also analyze the importance of metadata for the collection

1.2 Objectives of the Work

This report intends to analyze the requirements of film collection metadata and then present a metadata strategy for the dissemination of a small collection of films. This is done by watching the film and extracting necessary information that will help build the metadata. It will also involve analysis of the end user intended for the resource for the purpose of coming up with the best administrative metadata for that user (The British Atmospheric Data Centre, 2012). This report will also look into the type of films that are intended to help in building a structural metadata for the collection.

The objective of this report is to propose the metadata standards that are suitable for the resource material and to show how they should be implemented to achieve the set goals

2.0 Literature Review

To come up with the right metadata necessary to facilitate dissemination of a video object on the web, it is important to understand the various types of metadata that one can use.  According to previous research data, a video format is a very complex object and thus it may need a hybrid of the types of metadata as outlined below to enable it to serve its purpose. This is because the importance of metadata is not what it is applied to, but rather the purpose that it should serve (Caplan, 2003). The success of the metadata strategy depends on the ability to make a metadata schematic draft, correct documentation of the data dictionary and the creation of standards for video formats (Palgrave Macmillan Journals, 2010). There are various types of metadata that are necessary for the film collection.

Various researches have been conducted on the importance of metadata. It is essential for the developer and users to know why it is important to develop metadata before they can embark on creating metadata or to use the provided software that help in construction of metadata. The functions of metadata include and are not limited to the following; metadata facilitates determination of resource by relevance, relation criteria, site information or identifying resources themselves. Metadata also helps in managing electronic resources by arranging links to resources based on similarity or audience or by constructing pages from metadata accumulated in databases. It is the work of metadata to aid interoperability by using schemes of metadata or ‘shared transfer protocol’ and ‘cross walks’. Various online libraries have developed metadata that helps in interoperability and makes data transfer easier. The other function of metadata is to aid digital classification. This is done by identifying the position of a digital resource according to a file name, URL and persistent identifiers, such as DOI (Digital Object Identifier). Storage metadata helps in documentation and protection of the resources (Zeng, 2007).

The development of metadata is necessary for ensuring protection of the resources or the way it is accessed. This is because digital information is very delicate and can be distorted or adjusted. The technology also changes from time to time. It is important to keep abreast with the technology and update the resources accordingly. Metadata offers the lifeline for data survival and maintained accessibility in the future. This has opened a research field in the technology industry in trying to keep the data safe and relevant. Prior research has managed to come up with metadata to help in following the history of digital object by detailing its material attributes and filing its behaviour to copy it in the potential technologies (Caplan, 2003).

A lot of research has also dealt with the standards of metadata. These help the developer to choose from a variety standards that suit his/her metadata effectively. The standards are mostly arranged according to the type of object that the metadata is being developed for. They help one to distinguish the type of extensions to be used in the metadata for encoding and decoding purposes. They include and are not limited to the Dublin core, the METS (Metadata Encoding And Transmission Standards), the MODS (Metadata Objects Description Schemas), Encoded Archival Description (EAD) and Learning Object Metadata (LOM) (Baca, 2002).

3.0 Observations

The research focused on coming up with the types of metadata that are applicable to the film collection. There are various types of metadata standards and the choice of the standards to use depends upon the type of resource material. The resource material can be a text or a digital recording. In this case, the resource material is a collection of films. According to the research done, there are different forms of metadata. There are classified into three categories, as stated below:

• Descriptive metadata
• Administrative metadata
• Structural metadata

Administrative metadata is further classified into:

ü  Technical metadata

ü  Security and rights management metadata

4.0 Analysis of the Observations

Metadata is defined as data about data. It is used to describe the content and type of the resource material. The resource material is the data for which metadata is made. It contains either a text, or material or recordings, such as a digital film or sound recording. The standards used determine the type extensions on any file which is necessary for decoding of the data.

4.1 Types of Metadata

4.1.1 Descriptive Metadata

This type of metadata helps the user find the data they are looking for. It contains information which shows the user how to find an object, differentiate it from others that resemble it and how best it suits the intended needs. Information, such as the degree of interoperability, is also crucial because it helps the user determine what other models can be used with it (Caplan, 2003).

The descriptive metadata for the collection of films is highly dependant on the user type and key words that are used in searching. Below is an example of features that might be included in the metadata for the film L_auberge-ensorcele

Table 1: L_auberge-ensorcele (Palgrave Macmillan Journals, 2010)

4.1.2 Administrative Metadata

This data helps the creator manage the resources. Mostly, this type of metadata does overlap with descriptive metadata because it contains information showing how the object of concern was created, who created it, as well as manages its access and archives, the limitation that applies to its access and the terms of use within the repository. To come up with effective administrative metadata, it is important to keep in mind the intended user and what degree of access they would require without feeling restricted (Caplan, 2003). administrative metadata (Palgrave Macmillan Journals, 2010)

In this case, the administrative metadata should be visible to the team members behind the resource management as opposed to the intended user. (Dublin Core Metadata Initiative, 2010)

A)    Technical metadata

Technical metadata is most important because it helps establish the in-depth formatting of the resource. It often describes the properties of the digital file by giving detailed physical characteristics of the resource in order to rebuild it or convert it into another format. This is especially true in cases when the original file has been altered or compressed into a smaller newer version. The components of the technical metadata are detailed in the table below. Key elements include the original format that the video was created in, aspect ratio, as well as encoding formats (Palgrave Macmillan Journals, 2010).

Below is a sample of the technical metadata that is necessary for the dissemination of the films on the web.

When describing the ‘origination format’ of a video asset, a controlled vocabulary provides users with the ability to consistently tag and effectively search for a given format. Some technical metadata, such as the time when the film was taken and resolution used, is automatically embedded in the resource (Lubas, 2011). These often come with the device used to capture the film, including Flash Hi 8, MPEG and Windows Media.

B)    Security and rights management metadata

It is imperative to know the intended user for the asset before coming up with this type of metadata. It would be unwise to leave these kinds of management and control issues to the platform managers. It is, therefore, important to show clearly, the rights and security control parameters  for the films to enable the end user determine if the site suits his needs on access or not. Managers should encompass the metadata for security and restriction in the access control and not to rely on the customized control tools used by the platform (Baca, 2002).

Some of the metadata content to be found in this type of metadata includes the authentication and security of the data, such as encryption keys and passwords.. The technical metadata also allows tracking of the system response time and the digitization information of the resource material, in this case the films (Zeng, 2007).

4.1.3 Structural Metadata

This is the outer shell of the digital categories in the asset. It binds together the components of the multimedia entity, including associating the audio and the video for synchronization in a film. Unlike other types of metadata, this is intended for machine processing and not for display for the user.

It should be noted that structural metadata is meant for complex objects, such as collection of films, because it helps unite the formats in the entity, such as the text and movie. The structural metadata communicates the order or placement of individual films within a complex collection. Structural metadata covers both hierarchical relationships (scenes and the film as a whole) and the sequence or order within the larger whole (Caplan, 2003).

It is important to show the order number in this kind of metadata for this project because the films are located in different sites, therefore, links for easy access should be enabled. The example below shows the metadata for the film collection in relation to the structure of the films.4.2 Standards of Metadata

The importance of analyzing the standards is to make sure that the correct data measurement and valuation is attained. Metadata standards are used to form the platform for which the metadata is developed. Data component recognition and the ability to expand already disseminated data depend upon the type of standard used. The standards also define data quality of the films, as well as use and re-use parameters. The recommended standards for the film collection metadata are discussed in the next section (Baca, 2002).

5.0 Recommendations

5.1 Metadata Standards

These are mostly custom-made for a particular industry that metadata is developed for. The following standards can be used to develop metadata for the films.

• · The EAD-encoded archival description will help in retrieving the needed Information from the archives using XML. The film collection is linked to an archive or repository.
• · The MPEG-7 standards in this project would help in developing the descriptive metadata of the films. It specifies a set of descriptors to describe the various types of film information as analyzed in section 2.
• · The Dublin core standards would help in allowing the interoperability which helps the user to browse from the different parts of the world. (NC StateUniversity, 2012)

5.2 Metadata Strategy

Metadata responsibility and usage, the elements of the metadata, the metadata sources and quality control are all components of the strategy for the implementation. It is important to come up with a metadata strategy for the collection of films before embarking on the task of collection of the data and formulation of the metadata. The strategy for the storage type should be determined and similar products established (Smith, 2006).

6.0 Conclusions

The conclusions arrived at in the report are as follows:.

1. It is important to come up with metadata for the collection of films in order to aid the user in quick retrieval of the films. The intention of this report was to come up with a proposal for the metadata strategy for the dissemination of the film collection on the web. The key factors that would qualify the metadata developed as successful are if it is user-oriented rather than developer-oriented. (Baca, 2002).It is, however, important for the developer to secure his work by using security and restriction metadata.
2. In between the user and the manager of the asset is the machine, therefore, it is important to come up with the correct technical data to allow the machine to decode the data. The correct extension and links to the archives and the dictionary should be put in place (Caplan, 2003).
3. The structural metadata is equally important in making sure that the aspects of the resources are well-linked. Although placed in different folder and having different extensions, it is important that all the components of the resources metadata be held together, so that there is a smooth flow of information between them (Caplan, 2003).
4.  It is also important to establish convenient standards that should be used to help in dissemination of the metadata and the resources on the web. This is because they define the type of extensions to re-use and the level of interoperability to be allowed. (Dublin Core Metadata Initiative web document)