In almost all Web 2.0 platforms users can generate metadata. Metadata are data about data. As we know from David Weinberger’s “Everything is miscellaneous” one’s data are other’s metadata.
Metadata are of some importance in the Web 2.0, e.g. metdata describe properties of digital items.
While for some digital items metadata are very important like for websites in del.icio.us and digital images in flickr.com, they are less important for other digital items like digital movies in youtube.com.
While in deli.ico.us and other social bookmarking systems the users “share” the digital item described by the metadata, in flickr.com the digital item itself was created and is owned by one single user. So, metadata describe digital items found and digital items created. Big Question. Are the metadata used to describe found items different, similar or the same than the metadata used for describing digtal images by the creator of the item herself?
Tim O’Reilly wrote in his seminal essay “What is Web 2.0” that one difference between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 is the difference between stickiness and syndication. He is right. Syndication helps aggregating data sources, creating added value and distributing information. While the data themselves are easy to syndicate in most of the cases (a good counterexample is last.fm), metadata are still “sticky”. What does this mean? Since the data, the digital data are for free in many cases and every Web 2.0 social software would immediately kill itself by not letting users accessing them in arbitrary manners, the creators of such software are seeking new ways to keep users in their systems. One way is not to set free the now very powerful metadata.
