Showing papers by "Shigeo Sugimoto published in 2017"

A Metadata Model to Organize Cultural Heritage Resources in Heterogeneous Information Environments

Abstract: Cultural Heritage Information (CHI) is scattered among memory institutions, and connecting them together is an important issue for their continued discovery, access, and use. This study proposes a generalized model named Cultural Heritage in Digital Environments (CHDE), which enables the organizing of both tangible and intangible cultural heritage in heterogeneous information environments. The model collects all related digital resources into one instance, which can be later digested into a single digital archive on the networked environment, based on the One-to-One Principle of Metadata. We specially focus on organizing intangible cultural heritage through their instantiations. The proposed model is mapped to renowned cultural heritage models to identify the component entities and to clarify their strengths and the weaknesses. We use South and Southeast Asian cultural heritage information to evaluate the suitability of this model, which is a novel approach in the region.

Permanence and Temporal Interoperability of Metadata in the Linked Open Data Environment

Abstract: This paper discusses longevity issues of metadata in the Linked Open Data (LOD) environment, where metadata is transferred and shared on the open Web as a digital object. The fundamental issue of metadata permanence is to keep metadata interpretable by machines and humans over time. The goal of this discussion is to clarify risks in permanence of metadata and issues in the long-term management of metadata and metadata schemas in the LOD environment. This paper discusses metadata longevity from a few different viewpoints in order to clarify the requirements of metadata permanence in the LOD environment, which are different from those in conventional document-like object environment or database-centric environment. Longevity of metadata is, in other words, the temporal interoperability of metadata. This paper uses the Metadata Application Profile methodology supported by the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI) and DCMI’s layered model of metadata interoperability to understand the nature of metadata in the LOD environment. Then, this paper discusses metadata longevity based on a set of facets of metadata entities such as metadata schemas. Finally, it briefly discusses issues to use provenance description of metadata schemas and metadata schema registries from the viewpoint of long-term maintenance of metadata schemas

Provenance Description of Metadata Vocabularies for the Long-term Maintenance of Metadata

Abstract: Abstract Purpose The purpose of this paper is to discuss provenance description of metadata terms and metadata vocabularies as a set of metadata terms. Provenance is crucial information to keep track of changes of metadata terms and metadata vocabularies for their consistent maintenance. Design/methodology/approach The W3C PROV standard for general provenance description and Resource Description Framework (RDF) are adopted as the base models to formally define provenance description for metadata vocabularies. Findings This paper defines a few primitive change types of metadata terms, and a provenance description model of the metadata terms based on the primitive change types. We also provide examples of provenance description in RDF graphs to show the proposed model. Research limitations The model proposed in this paper is defined based on a few primitive relationships (e.g. addition, deletion, and replacement) between pre-version and post-version of a metadata term. The model is simplified and the practical changes of metadata terms can be more complicated than the primitive relationships discussed in the model. Practical implications Formal provenance description of metadata vocabularies can improve maintainability of metadata vocabularies over time. Conventional maintenance of metadata terms is the maintenance of documents of terms. The proposed model enables effective and automated tracking of change history of metadata vocabularies using simple formal description scheme defined based on widely-used standards. Originality/value Changes in metadata vocabularies may cause inconsistencies in the longterm use of metadata. This paper proposes a simple and formal scheme of provenance description of metadata vocabularies. The proposed model works as the basis of automated maintenance of metadata terms and their vocabularies and is applicable to various types of changes.

Aggregating Metadata from Heterogeneous Pop Culture Resources on the Web

Abstract: Japanese pop culture resources, such as manga, anime, and video games, have recently experienced an increase in both their consumption, and appreciation for their cultural significance. Traditionally seen as solely recreational resources, the level of bibliographic description by cultural heritage institutions has not kept up with the needs of users. In seeking to remedy this, we propose the aggregation of institutional data, and rich hobbyist data sourced from the web. Focusing on manga, a form of Japanese comic, this paper discusses classification and aggregation, with the goal of improving bibliographic description through the use of fan created data. Bibliographic metadata for manga was collected from the Japanese Agency for CulturalAffairs media arts database, along with several Englishlanguage manga fan websites.The datawas organized into classesto enable property matching across data providers, and then tested with existing ontologies and aggregation models,namely Europeana and the Open Archives Initiative’s Object Reuse and Exchange, to determine their suitability in working with these unique resources. The results show that existing ontologies may be suitable for use with pop culture materials, but that new vocabulary terms may need to be created if there is an abundance of granular data that existing ontologies fail to properly describe. In addition, the OAI-OREn aggregation method proved to be more promising than EDM when examining the aggregation of related pop culture resources. The paper discusses these issues, as well as recommendations for addressing them moving forward.

Metadata-Driven Approach for Keeping Interpretability of Digital Objects through Formal Provenance Description.

Abstract: Metadata about digital objects help users find, understand, use and reuse those objects. Longevity of digital objects is a vital issue for digital preservation, which means that the metadata about digital objects must be maintained as well, so that their content and meaning should be maintained over time. Open Archival Information System (OAIS) defines three metadata components, which have to be maintained with Digital Object – Representation Information of Digital Object, Preservation Description Information (PDI) in an Information Package, and the Content Information given to every Information Package. Provenance of a digital object, which is one of the five categories of PDI, is a crucial record of the history of the object over its lifecycle. Since metadata are exchanged as digital objects on the Web, machine-readable and interoperable provenance description of metadata is required for the longterm maintenance of metadata. This paper presents issues in the longevity of metadata, especially the issue of metadata provenance based on the Singapore Framework for Dublin Core Application Profiles (DCAP), which is well known for metadata interoperability in the networked information environment. The paper first briefly discusses features of metadata as first class objects on the Web. Then, we address potential risks in affecting interpretability of digital objects and issues in the consistent maintenance of metadata. Next, the W3C PROV standard for general provenance description and Resource Description Framework (RDF) for metadata exchange on the Web are adopted as the base models for provenance description of metadata. We developed simple provenance description models for formal provenance description for both structural features and vocabularies of metadata. The models are designed based on Entities and Activities defined by the W3C PROV in correspondence with primitive changes of metadata application profiles and metadata vocabularies, respectively. We also provide formal provenance description examples corresponding to structural changes in a metadata application profile along with semantic changes in the use of its metadata vocabulary. We discuss limitations of our proposed models and review provenance related research. Finally, the main findings of this research are summarized in the conclusions.

Estimating Domain Models from Metadata Instances to Improve Usability of LOD Datasets

Abstract: Linked Open Data(LOD), which is one of the efforts to help realize semantic web, has gradually become popular. Many Linked Open Data datasets, however are not well utilized. There are multiple reasons for this, such as a low level of recognition of LOD, limited usability of LOD datasets and so on. In attempting to solve these issues, we focused on a metadata schema that describes the structure about metadata instances in each LOD dataset. As information about metadata schema are not typically released, it is difficult to use LOD datasets. Therefore, in this research we extract the domain model, which is one piece of information about a metadata schema, from metadata instances. Domain models are suitable for understanding the rough structure of a metadata instances in an early stage. We developed an estimation method to generalize a process of understanding metadata schema when people, who are not familiar to the datasets, deal with. We then apply the estimation method to existed datasets.