Jerry McDonough: METS

Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard (METS) is a hub standard that links metadata and files. Jerry McDonough of the New York University Libraries presented on METS at the TEI Members’ Meeting. He showed a neat use of METS to joint an MPEG video clip to a TEI transcript, but the heart of his talk was about the proliferation and interaction of standards like TEI, EAD, METS, IMS, and so on. There is a temptation to think that with a bit more a standard like the TEI can embrace (swallow) other standards giving us one instead of many. He argued that a) we don’t technically need to merge related standards, and b) it is not right to do that. He pointed to the politics and histories of these groups/standards. We need a sociology of standards.
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How to use a book

http://homepages.nyu.edu/~mz34/helpdesk.WMV is a video clip in Danish that is a very funny look at the technology of the book. One of the funniest things I have seen in a while and I don’t understand Danish. This came via the TEI-L and Matthew Zimmerman. We need an English version.

Update: Philip sent me a link to a YouTube version with English subtitles. Somehow it isn’t quite as funny.

Web advertising begins to pay

A story in the Guardian Unlimited title, Online cashes in at last by Own Gibson (Oct. 18, 2004) reports on new UK data that shows that internet advertising has risen past Cinema to challenge radio.

According to research due to be unveiled today by Microsoft’s internet arm MSN, confidence is higher than ever among sales staff at major sites such as MSN, AOL and Yahoo! and the agencies that buy space on them. After years of trying, and in some cases under-delivering, it looks as if the internet’s accountability, measurability and targeting is finally making an impression on the big brands. In certain sectors, notably cars and finance, online ads are now an integral part of any big campaign, rather than an afterthought.

I wonder what percentage of this is Google ads?

Retailers to ID buyers of mature games in Canada

canada.com in a story “Want game? Bring your ID, retailers ward”, reports that major retailers like Walmart, The Bay, Zellers, Blockbuster and Radio Shack will ask for ID when selling mature games. The game business in Canada is about $1 billion and retail chains account for 90% of sales according to the Retail Council of Canada. The ratings system being used is the Entertainmenet Software Rating Board in New York.

Croquet Project

The Croquet Project is developing an architecture for educational 3D networked computing. The idea is an OS that supports multiuser 3D shared worlds. Could this be an architecture for game studies to use?

Croquet is a combination of computer software and network architecture that supports deep collaboration and resource sharing among large numbers of users within the context of a large-scale distributed information system. Along with its ability to deliver compelling 3D visualization and simulations, the Croquet system’s components are designed with a focus on enabling massively multi-user peer-to-peer collaboration and communication. (Introduction, http://croquetproject.org/About_Croquet/about.html)

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Change the world: Institute without Boundaries

Institute without Boundaries is a collaboration between Bruce Mau Design and George Brown College. The Massive Change project is one of their joint projects. (See previous entry on Massive Change and Overrated Sight.) I am not sure what to think about the hubris of their announced goal, “Change the world” and their suggestion that design is the way, “What if life itself became a design project?”. It is good they are audacious, but when you exaggerate design into a salvation project can you live up to your design? Does the project remain a sketch?
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