Metadata Matters

John Horodyski

• Publisher: Auerbach Publications
• Year: 2022
• ISBN:
  9781000597448
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Computer Science
• Subtopic: Web Development
• Index: Computer Science

"In what is certain to be a seminal work on metadata, John Horodyski masterfully affirms the value of metadata while providing practical examples of its role in our personal and professional lives. He does more than tell us that metadata matters—he vividly illustrates why it matters." —Patricia C. Franks, PhD, CA, CRM, IGP, CIGO, FAI, President, NAGARA, Professor Emerita, San José State University, USA

If data is the language upon which our modern society will be built, then metadata will be its grammar, the construction of its meaning, the building for its content, and the ability to understand what data can be for us all. We are just starting to bring change into the management of the data that connects our experiences.

Metadata Matters explains how metadata is the foundation of digital strategy. If digital assets are to be discovered, they want to be found. The path to good metadata design begins with the realization that digital assets need to be identified, organized, and made available for discovery. This book explains how metadata will help ensure that an organization is building the right system for the right users at the right time. Metadata matters and is the best chance for a return on investment on digital assets and is also a line of defense against lost opportunities. It matters to the digital experience of users. It helps organizations ensure that users can identify, discover, and experience their brands in the ways organizations intend. It is a necessary defense, which this book shows how to build.

Chapter 1 In Praise of Metadata: Lost and Found

1.1 An Airplane Saga

I fly on airplanes. A lot.

In fact, I fly more than a lot. I travel pretty much each week to one of my regular business destinations where my clients are situated. From New York City, to Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington DC, Vancouver, Toronto, London, Amsterdam, and on it goes. As a frequent flier, I am fortunate to receive premium levels of membership for airlines for which such status affords me premium seating and all things associated with “premium” for airlines. You can most often find me in 2A, the window seat of course, either working away on my laptop, reading a book, or gazing out the window for inspiration at 34,000 feet. This is forced luxury at its finest.

I consult with large corporations on their management of information; their digital assets; and, more importantly, the information about their assets—their metadata. Whatever it may be—television shows, consumer products, or marketing materials—I work with and consult on how to better organize their assets for improved identification, distribution, use, and reuse, both internally within their organization and externally to the public and to all those consuming and using their assets. As a librarian and an archivist, I have made my living helping others organize and be organized in their business systems and processes. I have been described as a metadata guru, a taxonomist, a librarian, and a digital sleuth . . . all true at various points in time, and all factual as regards my efforts to help organize information. Metadata is critical for findability and discovery, for if your assets are not organized in any meaningful way, they cannot be found. And, without question, they want to be found.

A unique event last year brought forth a new travel experience for me with another business trip which started out so well from my flight from Atlanta to New York City, and looking forward to touching down at La Guardia to then head home and settle in for a bit of respite. And, as usual, I was comfortably seated in 2A, this time on an airline (name protected to preserve the innocent) with four rows of first class, two-by-two, thereby equally 16 passengers at the front. Upon boarding the plane, I found my seat, tossed my laptop on it, and then placed my carry-on luggage in the overhead bin. My luggage is a standard black Tumi of carry-on luggage measurements, with a black Aeroplan Super Elite luggage tag, which has stood by me for many years. A few scrapes and scars, but it certainly has aged well. The flight was comfortable, no turbulence to speak of, and I was able to get some emails written thanks to the Wi-Fi on board. The plane landed on time, taxied to the gate, and parked for the night. Then the adventure began.

As the plane parked and the perfunctory and well-understood arrival bell rang, we all rose like members of a courtroom, ready for action. Most stretched, others yawned, but all raised their hands to the overhead bin to grab their carry-on luggage and go. So, that’s what I did . . . but my luggage was not there. My initial response, and truly the only response I had at the moment, was, “That’s impossible.” There were only 12 of us here in first class, and it could not have gone astray during the flight. So where was it? I could sense the urgency of those folks in rows 3 to 6 who also wanted to get up and go, but I stood there staring at the bin, wondering what sort of incredible magic trick this could be. If it were only a rabbit in the hat, but it was my luggage . . . my clothes, my toiletries . . . my essentials for life on the road.

As the flight was not full, there were only four passengers ahead of me in the first row. Surely, they would not have taken my bag, as they already had their own . . . how odd that would be. And then I noticed a piece of luggage in my bin that was rather more charcoal than black and, in fact, quite smaller than mine. And upon a further look, it was quite roughed up . . . certainly not my luggage. But yet, there it sat, untouched, and in splendid isolation in the overhead bin, as everyone else pushed by me and made their way off the plane. Something was just not right, and that charcoal, scruffy-looking luggage was now part of my experience, whether I wanted it to be or not. The choice was not mine.

By this time, all of first class had exited the plane, and economy class was halfway through their exit ritual. The only thing I could do was speak to Kate, the service director at the door, who had been so great to me and all the other passengers during the flight. I walked up to her and proclaimed, “I think we have an interesting situation here.” “Mr. Horodyski,” she said, “whatever is the matter?” “Well,” I exclaimed, “my luggage appears to be missing.” “What?” she gasped. “That’s impossible. Are you sure? How could that be?” Emphatically, I agreed, all the while beginning to worry that something strange, not necessarily evil, but was on.

“Is there a chance that someone took my bag by accident?” I asked. “Oh my, no, that never happens,” Kate responded. It was at that moment that we both looked at each other and realized that perhaps this was the first time for each of us when the normal rules of business travel might well have been broken. Our eyes locked in confusion and a slight twinge of despair, then slowly we turned our heads to the overhead bin.

She pointed to the bin and said, “Is that not your bag?” To which I exclaimed, “No, it certainly isn’t.” Of course, I had not actually checked that bag firsthand, but I was confident it was not my bag. So I reached up to take the bag down. Without a doubt, it was not my bag. Not only did it not look like my bag, but it was as light as a feather, probably only 10 pounds or so . . . hardly enough for more than three days of travel.

As I placed the luggage on the floor and raised the handle to steer it down the aisle, I noticed a tag. Not my black Aeroplan Elite tag, but a tag nonetheless, weathered and worn, and with the name Adam Smith (name changed to protect the guilty, or innocent, depending upon your point of view). I wheeled the luggage to Kate and proclaimed, “This is NOT my bag.” This fact was now clear. There was no innuendo, no circumstance, and no confusion. All data elements were there to show that this was a fact.

“Oh no,” gasped Kate, “how could this be? I can’t believe it.” “Well, believe it,” I said, “this is not my bag, but Adam Smith’s bag. I want my bag back. How do you suppose we might accomplish this request?” She threw her hands in the air and shouted, “Yes. Adam Smith! He was the elderly gentleman seated in 1B ahead of you. I remember him.” At that moment, she moved into action and said, “Let’s go! We can do this. We can find your luggage, as it must be with Adam Smith,” Immediately, she grabbed the airplane phone and called the check-in desk.

So there we were—Kate, myself, and Adam Smith’s charcoal, weathered, and worn luggage—exiting the plane and rushing to the check-in desk.

As I watched Cheryl, the attendant at the check-in, desk turn on the computer, it was if I heard Han Solo arrogantly boast, “Watch this!” as he ignited the Millennium Falcon into hyperdrive. I was both cautiously optimistic and eagerly curious to see where this digital sleuth work could lead. “Let’s find Mr. Smith and what he is all about,” Cheryl pronounced. And sure enough, by a few keystrokes on the computer, Cheryl retrieved the flight manifesto and was able to find Adam Smith’s name. But that was just the beginning. She then clicked on his name and was able to see more information about Mr. Smith, including his address and phone numbers. “We have a home phone number and a cell number for him, so let’s try the cell number, as he has to still be here in the airport.” And that’s exactly what she did—she called Mr. Smith on his mobile phone. “It’s busy,” she said and quickly added, “he must be here in the airport talking on the phone. So, let’s try Plan B,” Cheryl concluded. “Let’s phone his home number to try and get a message to him.” So, that’s what she did. Cheryl now had access to such powerful data about Adam Smith that she was able to use this for our common good.

She dialed his home phone number. “Hello,” answered a pleasant-sounding woman. “Is this Mr. Adam Smith’s residence?” asked Cheryl. “Yes, it is,” the caller responded, “I am his wife, how might I help you?” “It’s Cheryl Jones from the airline, and we are trying to locate your husband. It appears that he has taken someone else’s luggage by accident, and we need to get it back.” “Oh dear,” exclaimed Mrs. Adam Smith, “that’s not good to hear; are you sure?” “Yes, ma’am, I am pretty confident that there has been a mistake made with the bag.” It was at that moment that Cheryl used her camera phone to show the luggage to Mrs. Adam Smith. There was a slight pause, and then she responded, “Well, my goodness. Yes, you are correct. I am so sorry. That is not my husband’s luggage . . . it looks like it, but yes, the tag is clearly not his . . . it is John Horodyski’s. That’s what the tag says.” Accessing the metadata about Adam Smith and my bag had solved our dilemma.

1.2 Metadata Matters

Metadata matters because it gives structure and meaning to the data associated with all that we do in our business and personal transactions.

Metadata matters because it is both identification and discovery; it’s about access.

Metadata matters because it tells you where your content came from, where it is going, and how it can be used.

Metadata matters because it is the foundation of your content. Metadata is more important than we know: it defines our personal and business data, and yet it is still mysterious and not as well known as it should be. Metadata development is a strategic imperative in the endeavor to effectively manage and exploit a company’s content and knowledge. The successful implementation of any content-related strategy—for data, digital assets, or text—requires implementation of a holistic metadata schema that is supported by technology, people, and process. Metadata increases the return on investment of a content system by unlocking the potential to ingest, discover, share, and distribute assets.

This book is both an appreciation of metadata and a way in which to share the value and importance of metadata. The more we understand something, the better we are able to appreciate it and use it wisely in our personal and business affairs. Metadata, like language itself, is a reflection of all of us . . . it is both subjective and objective at the same time, as it tries to define who we are, what we are doing, when we are/were doing it, how, and why. It is not immune to race and gender bias, and to ageism and opinion, but with good governance metadata responds as society evolves and reflects a more respectful understanding of the human condition and the content it creates.

Metadata is specific. Metadata is general. Metadata describes all that we have so we may better understand what it is and what we need to do, providing as much meaning as possible. The opportunity for content owners, marketing technologists—all those managing content—is in understanding the value metadata provides to their assets and how it can empower their digital operations from creation, through discovery, to distribution. Metadata is the best way to protect yourself and defend your digital assets from information anxiety and mismanagement. If a good offense is your best defense with metadata as with anything else, then it is worth investing the time, energy, and resources to identify, define, and organize your assets for discovery. Metadata serves asset discovery by:

• Allowing assets to be found by relevant criteria
• Identifying assets
• Bringing similar assets together
• Distinguishing dissimilar assets
• Giving asset location information

Content is no longer “queen” . . . there are many in the realm, not the least of which is the user and the user experience. If you have great content and your users cannot find it, the value of the content is diminished or lost altogether. You need to understand how your users and customers want to interact with your assets before designing your metadata schemes. If you carry those user needs through to the back-end data structure, you’ll empower users with the categories and content attributes they need to filter and find what they want. I had one piece of black carry-on luggage that was now with someone else, and I wanted that luggage returned to me.

Metadata, by definition, is simply data about data. But it is so much more than that. It is the descriptive, administrative, and structural data that defines an asset, whether that asset is a photograph, a video, or even our unique and personal identification attributes. Metadata comprises the elements that keep us together and provides a frame of reference for our own discovery. Sometimes, it is good to have those elements, the technical “bits and bobs,” working for us, because sometimes that is all we have to work from, and when put together, through categories and associations, we are able to formulate an identification—a meaning. It is those very elements which define ourselves and our assets and provide meaning both in content and in context. No one, or no thing, wants to get lost.

1.3 Metadata in Three Acts

Metadata had its first publi...