Entering the IT jungle

I had the opportunity last night to attend a meeting of the Data Management Specialist Group of BCS, the Chartered Insitute for IT. I wish my classmates had been there because my learning outcome from this experience was special indeed.

With three talks taking place at BCS simultaneously, I had to peer through cracks in the wall in order to determine the correct venue for An Evening of Metadata. There was an acronym on the door that I didn't recognise, and the evening went from there. Arriving as the talks began, the only accessible seating was on the front row, where I noticed on either side of me some interesting gadgets that I hadn't actually seen before - someone's large personal microphone connected to a digital recorder, that seemed disproportionate to both the size of the venue and the occasion, and a computer writing tablet of some description.

Shortly into the first talk, I felt confident that I had no idea what was being communicated here. I couldn't tell you what metadata this was, or what it was for; I couldn't tell you who had designed it or why; I certainly didn't know how it functioned. It was a strange feeling of registering every word that was being said, writing most of that down in my notebook, and yet not understanding the meaning behind any of it. While the talk was in English, I had so little grasp of any context that I may well have benefitted as much had I received the talks in an antique dialect of the jungles of Yucatan.

So, was a semester of metadata a total waste of time? I had, after all, registered for this event at the recommendation of my tutor. Actually, for me, feeling like some kind of undercover agent about to be smoked out if he opened his mouth, there was something much more interesting going on here. In a simplistic way, DAM lies at a convergence between traditional information science and information technology. It would seem that both are employed more or less equally, with some solid management thrown in. I've already thought a great deal about the meeting of traditional preservation and digital preservation - I see it all the time (it's in my last posting, in fact). But until last night, I had never engaged with the IT sector in any way. My realisation was that, if one drew a line between the traditional information sciences and IT, then I was very much clinging to the former extreme, and much more so than I had realised previously.

This is important, because I feel that DAM needs to operate amongst all of these sectors. Increasingly, I am beginning to appreciate the importance of mediation in DAM. It's hard to imagine communicating the content of last night's event to a rare books librarian, for example, but at times, that's exactly what you need to do. We're 'migratory animals', as my colleague put it, and a good understanding (or sensititivy, at least) for information science, IT and business is just the beginning. From there, you can get on with the actual task of doing your DAM job.

Why have digital asset management?

I have a philosophy that you should always ask yourself why you're doing something when you do it (and preferably before), and keep on asking that question. For that reason, I wanted to backtrack and apply that to my new discipline, and to this blog. It will probably form a core stream of my writing here, tackling the 'what', 'why' and 'how' of DAM. A number of groups have described the key components in the operation of a DAM system, but I want to start by looking at the reasons for its being in the first place.

Briefly: the 'what'. It is probably the 'asset' within DAM that is most ambiguous, yet defines the discipline itself. My overriding sense of the term is that here assets are leverage. They are kept as a means to some conceptual end (as digital data at the logical level is never an end in itself) - looking at it in its broadest sense, that end could simply be that, in one way or another, someone is willing to invest their time in these assets, which is the key commodity in a digital economy. Any digital file needs to be worthy of an investment of time (that is, also, attention), otherwise it is not an asset.

In one example, digital records held by a business for legal reasons may never be seen, but have the potential for leverage in the eyes of the law. In another example, a university library's forward-thinking digital mission may capture a wider audience's attention and justify it's very existence to university administration, the leverage here serving to attract funding to ensure it's survival as a relevant institution. It could also be said that a business might potentially survive or collapse on the basis of its legal records.

All of this goes some way towards answering the 'why' of DAM, but this can clearly depend to a large extent on the sector within which one is operating a DAM system, as in the two examples above. At this stage I would like to look for some aspects of DAM that serve as the lowest common denominator in justifying its purpose. I believe that these are the access, efficiency and preservation of digital assets. These form the roots that then branch out into various manifestations of detail in different sectors.

1. Access: DAM allows for the dissemination of digital information to those who require it. There is no asset without access, and this involves the understanding and application of metadata and ontologies, which form a bridge between access and efficiency.


2. Efficiency: As well as optimising access, metadata and ontologies enhance suitability and reliability of information. Access needs to be rapid and fit for use to make digital information viable. This efficiency is the essence of the 'e' in e-learning, e-science &c. which in fact stands for enhanced - properly managed, digital information can undoubtedly enhance knowledge transfer.
   

3. Preservation: Data needs to remain compatible and often interoperable between systems for effective use and optimised access. In most cases, it also needs to meet these criteria of use and access for extended periods of time. DAM systems can deliver this and avoid the need for costly digital archaeology, or total data loss, in the future.