Title: Can a system make novice users experts? Analysis of metadata created by novices and experts with varying levels of assistance

Authors: Sue Yeon Syn, Michael B. Spring

Addresses: School of Information Sciences, University of Pittsburgh, 135 North Bellefield Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15260, USA. ' School of Information Sciences, University of Pittsburgh, 135 North Bellefield Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15260, USA

Abstract: Accurate description of web resources is one path to the development of the Semantic Web. Two major problems for metadata generation are lack of expertise and the number of web resources. An automated or semi-automated system could encourage creation of metadata for web resources. This work is focused on the design and assessment of a semi-automated Metadata-Generation System (MGS) using four classes of descriptive elements – bibliographic, semantic, keywords and structure. The study tries to assess how the level of knowledge or skill impacts the quality of the metadata generated and, based on the results, it suggests the kind of information automatic metadata generation tools should suggest to users.

Keywords: automatic metadata generation; evaluation; web resources; resource descriptions; semantic web; knowledge levels; skill levels; metadata quality.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMSO.2008.021890

International Journal of Metadata, Semantics and Ontologies, 2008 Vol.3 No.2, pp.122 - 131

Published online: 08 Dec 2008 *

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