The Good
Metadata provides fundamental meanings like the digital object’s title, type, when it was created, what library division it belongs to, if it’s a part of a library collection, and if it has any universal unique identifiers (UUIDs).
Let’s use the Julia Conyers Album, CA. 1769-1830 as a case study to explore the metadata in the New York Public Library’s (NYPL) Digital Collection. Much of the metadata captured in each digital record falls under the category of descriptive metadata, meaning that it allows users search for, find, and understand a digital object or resource. This descriptive metadata in associated digital records allow the user to find a specific record, like searching by creator name, object type (still image, for example), and a historical date range. Many of these metadata elements are hyperlinks, so clicking the element takes the user to a filtered search results page. For example, if the user wants to see all of the Digital Collection’s pieces in the Julia Conyers Album, CA. 1769-1830, they can do so by clicking the collection link in the LIBRARY DIVISION & COLLECTION WITH THIS ITEM section of the digital record.
This Digital Collection also uses structural metadata to help users find relationships between or within other digital resources. Almost every digital record has a VIEW THIS ITEM ELSEWHERE hierarchy so that the user can see other sources where this record is stored, a brief summary of the collection/library/digital project, and a hyperlink that takes them directly to the record in another digital source.
By hyperlinking many of the metadata elements, the NYPL is allowing the user to go as far and as deep as they’d like – the Digital Collection is simply providing the digitized object and then a roadmap for further research, but they’re doing so in an easy, clickable way. Before the user realizes it, they may be four to five pages deep into a collection that started with a simple search for digital objects with the word “dog” in their title. Therein lies one of the neatest elements of metadata – it has the possibility open doors the user may not even know are there to open and then explore what’s behind that door, thereby bringing their knowledge base to a whole different, hopefully deeper, level.
One final note: all of the records in the NYPL’s Digital Collection also have rights metadata, which informs the user of who owns the object and how they, as users, can use this object properly (and legally). This metadata is captured at the bottom of each record in a clearly defined RIGHTS STATEMENT, so the user does not have to guess what they can and cannot use – the Digital Collection spells everything out to them via this metadata.
The Questionable
While one of the benefits of metadata is its ability to send users on a knowledgeable digital journey via hyperlinking and behind-the-scenes connections, like grouping all photographs that capture flora and fauna from the 1930s, metadata doesn’t analyze – this part is still up to the user.
For example, the user isn’t able to click on an artist name in the NYPL’s Digital Collection and see a tooltip with a snapshot of the artist’s background, life, accomplishments, etc. A user can see all of the work in this artist’s collection that’s housed in the Digital Collection, but it’s solely up to them to take their research to that level of detail.
Which really leads to the next criticism of metadata – will users take their research to that (arguably much needed) level of detail, or will they settle on this sort of half-baked research/knowledge gathering?
Not that a picture can’t speak a thousand words! But then again, it doesn’t really speak a thousand words. The user isn’t able to learn more about an author, for instance, using metadata alone, so even though metadata creates this incredible web of connections (literally and figuratively), does it also leave a research gap that may promote this level of superficiality? Like Instagram – are users just going to say, “Neat picture! Oh, cool, it was painted in Germany in the 1870s.” And then move on without learning who painted it, their artistic inspirations, Germany in the late 19th century? Is metadata contributing to the digital era’s struggle with gnat-like attention spans?
