Linked Data
and Libraries:
What? Why?
How?
Emily Dust Nimsakont
Nebraska Library Commission
NCompass Live
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mytudut/5197551003/ January 11, 2012

An announcement from
the Library of Congress…
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alwright1/2613979675/

“…the Library community‟s data
carrier, MARC, is „based on forty-year-old
techniques for data management and is out
of step with programming styles of today.‟”
“…something new is now needed…”
“The new bibliographic framework project
will be focused on…Linked Data principles
and mechanisms…”
“A Bibliographic Framework for the Digital Age” http://www.loc.gov/marc/transition/news/framework-103111.html

What is
Linked
Data?

“…linked data describes a method of
publishing structured data so that it can be
interlinked and become more useful.”
“It builds upon standard Web technologies
such as HTTP and URIs, but rather than
using them to serve web pages for human
readers, it extends them to share
information in a way that can be read
automatically by computers.”
“This enables data from different sources
to be connected and queried.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linked_data

Semantic Web vs. Linked Data

web of documents
vs.
web of data

resource links to
resource
links to
links to
resource links to
links to resource
resource

data links to
data data
links to
data
links to
data
data links to
data
data
data
links to
data
data
data

Relationships are key
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Encoded meaning
<h1>This is a heading.</h1>
<p>This is a paragraph.</p>
<h1>My Favorite Trees</h1>
<p>I like oak trees.</p>
<p>I also like maple trees.</p>

Encoded meaning
<rdf:Description
rdf:about="http://www.recshop.fake/cd/Empire
Burlesque">
<cd:artist>Bob Dylan</cd:artist>
<cd:country>USA</cd:country>
<cd:company>Columbia</cd:company>
<cd:price>10.90</cd:price>
<cd:year>1985</cd:year>
</rdf:Description>
http://www.w3schools.com/rdf/rdf_example.asp

Links between entities
<rdf:Description rdf:about=“http://www4.wiwiss.fu-
berlin.de/bookmashup/books/0375507256”>
<rev:hasReview rdf:resource=“http://www4.wiwiss.fu-
berlin.de/bookmashup/reviews/0375507256_EditorialReview1”
/>
<dc:creator rdf:resource=“http://www4.wiwiss.fu-
berlin.de/bookmashup/persons/David+Mitchell”/>
<dc:format>Paperback</dc:format>
<dc:identifier rdf:resource=“urn:ISBN:0375507256”/>
<dc:publisher>Random House Trade Paperbacks</dc:publisher>
<dc:title>Cloud Atlas: A Novel</dc:title>
</rdf:Description>
http://commonplace.net/2009/06/linked-data-for-libraries/

data links to
data data
links to
data
links to
data
data links to
data
data
data
links to
data
data
data

1. Data instead of documents
2. Relationships are key
3. Encoded meaning
4. Links between entities
So what?

Linked
Data
makes the
Web into a
database.

How does
Linked Data
happen?

Linked Data Principles
Use HTTP URIs so
Use URIs as names
people can look up
for things
these names
When someone looks
up a URI, provide Include links to other
useful URIs, so that they can
information, using the discover more things
standards
Tim Berners-Lee, “Linked Data-Design Issues.”
http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/LinkedData.html

URIs
Uniform Resource Identifiers = unique identifiers
http://www.example.com/thing1

RDF
Resource Description Framework
Describes relationships based on triples (statements):
subject-predicate-object
http://www.w3.org/RDF

RDF
predicate
subject object
has
A Christmas author
Charles
Carol Dickens

RDF Graph
has
author A Christmas
has
Carol publisher
Charles
Dickens
Penguin

RDF Graph with URIs
http://example.org/
hasAuthor http://example.org/books/2002275771
http://example.org/hasPublisher
http://id.loc.gov/authorities/
names/n78087607/
http://example.org/publishers
/12345

RDF
<rdf:Description
rdf:about=“http://example.org/books/2002275771”>
<dc:creator
rdf:resource=“http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/n780
87607”/>
<dc:publisher
ref:resource=“http://example.org/publishers/12345” />
</rdf:Description>

Ontologies
An ontology is a vocabulary of specific
terms to be used to describe resources.
Sound familiar?

5 Stars of Linked Open Data
★ Available on the web
★★ Available as structured data
★★★ Available in a non-proprietary format
★★★★ Use open standards to identify
things, so people can point at your stuff
★★★★★ Link your data to other people‟s
data to provide context
http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/LinkedData.html

Linked OPEN
Data
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Why should
libraries care
about Linked
Data?

Changes to
bibliographic
data

Bibliographic Record
In traditional
Author
cataloging, a
Title
record is one
package.

Bibliographic
Record
Bibliographic
Record
Bibliographic
Record Records can be
exchanged, but there is no
way to exchange the
individual pieces of
information within a
record.

With Linked Data, a bibliographic record
is made up of many pieces of data.
Bibliographic Record
Person And the
relationships
Is author of
between
these pieces
of data are
Title
defined.

The
Bibliographic Record
boundaries
Person of the
record can
Is author of
be
dissolved…
Title

…and the
Bibliographic Record data can
interact with
Person
other
Is author of
information
on the
Title Web…

…and make
Bibliographic Record use of other
Person data on the
web.
Is author of
Title

New
federated
search
possibilities

New ways
of searching
our catalogs

New homes
for
librarians‟
skills

Are there
sources of
linked library
data?

http://id.loc.gov

http://viaf.org

http://dewey.info/

http://rdvocab.info/

http://richard.cyganiak.de/2007/10/lod/

What does
Linked Data
look like?

http://www.nines.org

http://www.civilwardata150.net/

http://www.openlibrary.org

Resources

The Thirty Minute Guide to RDF
and Linked Data
by Ian Davis and Tom Heath
http://www.slideshare.net/iandavis/30-minute-
guide-to-rdf-and-linked-data

Be Part of the Web - Not Just On It:
Report of the Stanford Linked Data
Workshop, 27 June - 1 July 2011
http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub152/LinkedDataWorkshop.pdf

Linked Open Data in Libraries,
Archives, and Museums
http://lod-lam.net/

Managing Metadata
by Laura Smart
http://library.caltech.edu/laura/

ALA Linked Data Interest Group
http://connect.ala.org/node/142470

Bibliographic Framework
Transition Initiative
http://www.loc.gov/marc/transition/

BIBFRAME listserv
http://listserv.loc.gov/listarch/bibframe.html

Thank you!
Emily Dust Nimsakont
Cataloging Librarian
Nebraska Library Commission
emily.dust.nimsakont@nebraska.gov
800-307-2665
www.delicious.com/NLC_Reference/ncompasslive+linkeddata
www.slideshare.net/nebraskaccess