Great discussion! My cataloger heart says that you can never have enough,
but my manager brain says that you only have a limited amount of resources
and time to dedicate. ;cD

I agree with Diane saying that metadata is not static. Your use cases will
change in the future due to changed user needs or new discovery layer
functionality, etc. The most important thing is getting a good core set of
fields/elements set at the beginning (keeping use cases and system
functionality in mind) and evolve from there. You also might want to keep
in mind how much work it will be if you add metadata fields in the future.
Will you be able to easily add information for the new fields in existing
metadata records?

An indirect comment - if you find yourself using fields now that you end up
not using in the near future due to search functionality/changes, do not
delete [or ignore, for that matter] those fields. 9 times out of 10 you
will find yourself wanting to use that metadata again in some shape or
form, and if you delete it, you're stuck with basically spending resources
recreating that metadata.

Thanks,
Becky, who is trying to cultivate her seedling EAC-CPF records for her
POW's new Islandora IR....

-----------------------------------------
Becky Yoose
Systems Librarian
Grinnell College


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