Piero Attanasio mEDRA: the European DOI agency The DOI as a tool for interoperability between private and public sector Athens, 14 January 2005

Summary Very shortly: What the DOI is and what mEDRA is The DOI and the public sector: some experiences When the DOI may help… (one example and a general model) … and when may not.

The DOI is a standard identifier DOI has a similar role for e-content trade like the Bar code has in commerce of tangible goods: it facilitates interoperability between the information systems of parties. For this reason:  The longer the value chain is, the higher the value of DOI mEDRA

The DOI Metadata Metadata schemas are required for different Applications Profiles (APs) Each schema includes a minimum set of metadata (kernel metadata)… … and additional metadata appropriate for the application profile. These last includes “descriptive metadata” (related to the genre of the resources) and “service and administrative metadata” (related to applications) The DOI is accompanied by metadata describing the identified entity mEDRA

DOI resolution system The underlying technology is the Handle System ® produced by CNRI (USA) Handle is a resolution system: i.e. a tool to resolve a number to a source of information (typically a URL). In some extent it belongs to the n2l (urn to url) tecnologies Handle allows multiple resolution: i.e. a DOI can point to more than one source of information The DOI is supported by a resolution system that make DOIs “actionable” in the Internet mEDRA

Resolution vs Identification Remind that “what the DOI identifies” and “what the DOI resolves to” are two different concepts What the DOI The DOI ® (Digital Object Identifier) is a standard for identifying any object of intellectual property. A DOI provides a means of persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related current data. On digital networks, all intellectual property is simply a string of bits; a DOI can apply to any form of intellectual property in any digital environment. DOIs have been called "the bar code for intellectual property": like the physical bar code, they are enabling tools for use all through the supply chain to add value and save cost. A DOI differs from commonly used internet pointers to material such as the URL – Uniform Resource Locator, the usual means of referring to World Wide Web material – because it identifies an object as a first-class entity, not simply the place where the object is located. A DOI is also different from commonly used identifiers of intellectual property like standard bibliographic and related identifiers (ISBN, ISSN, ISRC, etc) because it is associated with defined services and is immediately "actionable" on a network. However, the DOI does not compete with these standards since it allows them to be integrated as suffixes in DOI strings. A DOI is an implementation of the Internet concepts of Uniform Resource Name and Universal Resource Identifier. A DOI is different from abstract naming specifications such as URN in that it is a defined identification Identified entity Informat. on the document DOI Resolution 1 Resolution 2 Resolution 3 AbstractHow to buy the doc. Resolution 4 mEDRA

Resolution vs Identification It is also possible that DOI does not resolve to the identified entity What the DOI The DOI ® (Digital Object Identifier) is a standard for identifying any object of intellectual property. A DOI provides a means of persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related current data. On digital networks, all intellectual property is simply a string of bits; a DOI can apply to any form of intellectual property in any digital environment. DOIs have been called "the bar code for intellectual property": like the physical bar code, they are enabling tools for use all through the supply chain to add value and save cost. A DOI differs from commonly used internet pointers to material such as the URL – Uniform Resource Locator, the usual means of referring to World Wide Web material – because it identifies an object as a first-class entity, not simply the place where the object is located. A DOI is also different from commonly used identifiers of intellectual property like standard bibliographic and related identifiers (ISBN, ISSN, ISRC, etc) because it is associated with defined services and is immediately "actionable" on a network. However, the DOI does not compete with these standards since it allows them to be integrated as suffixes in DOI strings. A DOI is an implementation of the Internet concepts of Uniform Resource Name and Universal Resource Identifier. A DOI is different from abstract naming specifications such as URN in that it is a defined identification Identified entity (e.g. a book) Informat. on the document DOI Resolution 1 Resolution 2 AbstractHow to buy the doc. Resolution 3 mEDRA

What is mEDRA? mEDRA is a company created by AIE and Cineca to manage the DOI registration at European level It is an example of public (Cineca) private (AIE) partnership It was born after an eContent project It is based in Italy but operates across Europe, directly and through forthcoming sub-agencies

The DOI and the public sector TSO in UK is a registration agency that assigns DOIs to PSI The Office of Publication of the European Union has been recently (July 2004) appointed as DOI-RA for publications of EU organisations The OECD (through TSO) and the World Bank (through Crossref) started registering DOIs on their content Some national libraries joined the International DOI Foundation in last two years

mEDRA and the public sector The mEDRA early adopters are both in the private and in the public sector In Italy CNIPA (the Italian authority for IT in the public sector) participated since the beginning to the pilot project Some universities are starting DOI registration

When assigning DOIs to PSI is useful? When the value chain is long and complex Therefore: When the PSI is re-used in a private value chain When the PSI should interoperate with private sources

One example: the Italian portal of medicine content It is a project to aggregate content produced in Italy for medicine, including Journal articles Books and electronic monographs Learning objects for medical training It is open to content produced by private publishers and public institutions

The architecture of the service mEDRA DB Doi e MD Publishers DOI e MD Search Professional community Search interface MD quality control Publishers Public bodies Digital objects Tangible objects Aggregator Internet bookshop DOI resolution Metadata provision

A model for re-use of PSI Public sector DOI-RA DB Doi e MD Publishers Rights negotiation Access Public

Which could be the role of the DOI? Metadata may include rights information for PSI The DOI may guarantee persistence and facilitate up- grading of information used in private value chain Standardisation facilitates the creation of portals for content to be negotiated

When the DOI does not help If the value chain is short: When the public sector provides directly information to citizens When there is no need to interoperate with private sources In such cases any alternative system may work