On Mon, Jan 3, 2011 at 6:32 PM, Young,Jeff (OR) <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Bruce,
>
> The naming preferences and use cases of different authority agencies
> need to be accounted for.
This sounds a bit circular though :-)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but:
This whole business of authoritative names, it seems to me, is one
rather awkward solution to a more fundamental issue of identity: which
"Jane Doe" we're referring to. So libraries came up with solutions
that disambiguate by string names. So "John Doe" becomes, say, "John
Doe, 1783-1841".
With that, you then need to say who created that string identifier, so
you don't get conflicts between different ones. E.g. agency X does
"John Doe, 1783-1841" and agency Y does "John S. Doe:1783-1841" and
you need some way to make sense of that.
So the indirection, then, appears from the outside to look like a
solution that creates its own problems (the requirement you note
above).
But aren't there other ways to solve this identity-name problem, such
that we accept there may be many people with the name "John Doe"?
Bruce
> Take VIAF for example. That's one example of
> how the indirection of mads:MADSAuthority + mads:AuthorityScheme or
> skos:Concept + skos:ConceptScheme come in handy.
>
> I think the MADS focus on classifying names rather than things is
> upside-down, but that's how many people think about authorities. I would
> suggest that the skos:Concept abstraction (via foaf:focus) is the best
> way for us to flip them right-side up. ;-)
>
> Jeff
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Metadata Object Description Schema List
>> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Bruce D'Arcus
>> Sent: Monday, January 03, 2011 12:57 PM
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Re: [MODS] Mark Twain Rides Again (was Re: [MODS] MADS/RDF
> for
>> review)
>>
>> In plain English, isn't Mark Twain simply a pen-name, denoting an
>> alternate persona, for the person Samuel Clemens? Shouldn't the
>> modeling reflect that basic, fairly simple, logic?
>>
>> E.g. the most simple modeling:
>>
>> <http:whatever.org/1> a foaf:Person ;
>> foaf:name "Samuel Clemens" ;
>> mads:penName "Mark Twain" .
>>
>> ... or a little more complex, treat the two as discrete foaf:Person
>> subjects:
>>
>> <http:whatever.org/1> a foaf:Person ;
>> foaf:name "Samuel Clemens" ;
>> mads:alternatePersona <http:whatever.org/2> .
>>
>> <http:whatever.org/2> a foaf:Person ;
>> foaf:name "Mark Twain" ;
>> mads:alternatePersonaOf <http:whatever.org/1> .
>>
>> I don't get the value of indirection: of treating authors as concepts.
>>
>> Bruce
>
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