New pictures of old signs? What date?

[Translucence]

A great glimpse into the past is afforded when people take pictures of "ghost signs" - old advertising signs that are often revealed during renovations and demolishings. (There are lots of collections of them online)

But what year should one put on the photo if you upload it to HistoryPin? 2014 or 1892 ? Sometimes you can work out an approximate year for the sign.

I'm just thinking, if all current photographs are tagged as 2014 ... if someone wants to see old history of an area by setting a date range then it might exclude relevant artifacts from that era.

[Jon Voss]

My personal view on this is that the date should always correspond to the creation date of the photo or artwork, etc, just because I think that's the only way to handle it at scale. But would welcome other thoughts on this and use cases where the date field is tricky.

On this topic, I'd also encourage using a common tag for these kinds of images, like "ghostsigns".  That way you can filter your map just by ghostsigns. 

Jon

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[James Morley]

I'm with Jon on this one - date of creation of the image. Otherwise
you could argue that a Francis Bedford image from the 1860s of the
pyramids in Egypt should be dated more than 2000BC. OK a somewhat
extreme example!
---
James Morley
www.jamesmorley.net / @jamesinealing
www.whatsthatpicture.com / @PhotosOfThePast

[robin aka georgiawebgurl]

In terms of metadata for archival photographs, there are a few ways to handle this, e.g., a Dublin Core Qualified approach. Coverage is often used to establish the time period of an item; the date then reflects the date it was uploaded or added. You could also use (if applicable) DateCopyrighted or DateSubmitted from Dublin Core. From an archival standpoint,  using the date of the object photographed is confusing but limits search capabilities, too -- just for the reasons that have been pointed out (undergraduates have asked for photographs of dinosaurs...) Although photographs of paintings seem to be one area that is an exception because the photograph is (sometimes) seen as the surrogate for the painting. I do think Coverage or time span or era is extremely useful for archival photographs.  

In terms of traditional bibliographic cataloging (libraries), they would use the 260 MARC field (publisher, place, copyright date field in a library record) but then would use another field (and notes, most likely) to add in information about the original book or item. More recent practices (RDA, the new standard) would use multiple 264 MARC fields (a new field), meant to separate out the publisher, distributor, manufacturer, and copyright date. So, each 264 could have different dates with copyright being clearly identified by field labels. If you search in a library catalog right now, you may or may not  be able to see those, as this is really just about a year out in terms of implementation (which means lots of old records). Temporal / coverage date would be included in the subject headings aka the controlled vocabulary keywords. So, you might see something like the example below. Anyhow, my point being is that the publication date (similar to the upload date, if you think about everything on the internet as being "published") is analogous.  The original date would be separated out, depending upon the type of item - facsimiles (surrogates like the painting example above) are handled a bit different, as the original date is the date of publication, but the differences in dates are accounted for elsewhere within a record. 

I don't know if that helps or not - but dates are extremely important and libraries have traditionally had many ways of reflecting the different types of dates (not that the records are always correct -- it is complex and the standards have evolved over the hundreds of years of library metadata work (because card catalogs and journals are just a print form of metadata). :-) 

Robin Fay

LC

Main title	138th St. Station N.Y.C.R.R. Co. - 1886 [graphic].
Published/Created	1964 May 13, from a photograph taken earlier. Railroad stations--New York (State)--New York--1880-1890. Form/Genre Photographic prints-1880-1890-Reproductions-1960-1970. Halftone photomechanical prints-1880-1890-Reproductions-1960-1970.

http://catalog.loc.gov/vwebv/holdingsInfo?searchId=14033&recCount=25&recPointer=2&bibId=15204238

   

Coverage (spatial or temporal features of the intellectual content)

    <meta name    = "DC.Coverage.Temporal"
          content = "US civil war era; 1861-1865">
    <meta name    = "DC.Coverage.Spatial"
          content = "Columbus, Ohio, USA; Lat: 39 57 N Long: 082 59 W">
    <meta name    = "DC.Coverage.Spatial.Lat"
          content = "39 57 N">
    <meta name    = "DC.Coverage.Spatial.Long"
          content = "082 59 W">
    <meta name    = "DC.Coverage.Spatial"
          scheme  = "TGN"
          content = "Columbus (C,V)">

http://dublincore.org/documents/usageguide/qualifiers.shtml

Also similar to 

http://dlg.galileo.usg.edu/guide.html#06

http://scelc.org/files/ccdl-dc-metadata-best-practices.pdf

http://contentdivergent.blogspot.com

[Mike Strange]

Robin,

This is where the eyes glaze over!  The original role of Historypin was as a community project to encourage generations to meet on a level playing-field. It was an opportunity for 'granny' to dig out her albums (or perhaps boxes) of photographs and for 'her' to share them and the associated stories with technically able grandchildren who could then pin both to Historypin.

I don't see that this should ever become akin to a sophisticated archive or library and the mere mention of just the word metadata outside of this Group would have the community-user running a mile; is that what we want? 

Personally I would like to see the emphasis come back to schools and local projects. It is damned hard work but with a potentially much bigger social gain than being blitzed by thousands of images from an archive. It also aligns with the aims of the  We Are What We Do charitable foundation"to harness the success of our high profile work in local communities and across education .... to harness Historypin digital tools to deliver local community and educational programmes. Within communities to increase mutual feelings of value and understanding across different generations; increase feelings of local connectedness and cohesion; increase digital inclusion and digital literacy; increase the health and well-being of older people. Within education to deliver Historypin’s educational potential, across formal and informal learning, as both a passive, exploratory experience and as an active, collaborative experience."

Mike

On 16 Jun 2014 , robin aka georgiawebgurl said:

In terms of metadata for archival photographs, there are a few ways to handle this, e.g., a Dublin Core Qualified approach. Coverage is often used to establish the time period of an item; the date then reflects the date it was uploaded or added. You could also use (if applicable) DateCopyrighted or DateSubmitted from Dublin Core. From an archival standpoint,  using the date of the object photographed is confusing but limits search capabilities, too -- just for the reasons that have been pointed out (undergraduates have asked for photographs of dinosaurs...) Although photographs of paintings seem to be one area that is an exception because the photograph is (sometimes) seen as the surrogate for the painting. I do think Coverage or time span or era is extremely useful for archival photographs.  

In terms of traditional bibliographic cataloging (libraries), they would use the 260 MARC field (publisher, place, copyright date field in a library record) but then would use another field (and notes, most likely) to add in information about the original book or item. More recent practices (RDA, the new standard) would use multiple 264 MARC fields (a new field), meant to separate out the publisher, distributor, manufacturer, and copyright date. So, each 264 could have different dates with copyright being clearly identified by field labels. If you search in a library catalog right now, you may or may not  be able to see those, as this is really just about a year out in terms of implementation (which means lots of old records). Temporal / coverage date would be included in the subject headings aka the controlled vocabulary keywords. So, you might see something like the example below. Anyhow, my point being is that the publication date (similar to the upload date, if you think about everything on the internet as being "published") is analogous.  The original date would be separated out, depending upon the type of item - facsimiles (surrogates like the painting example above) are handled a bit different, as the original date is the date of publication, but the differences in dates are accounted for elsewhere within a record. 

I don't know if that helps or not - but dates are extremely important and libraries have traditionally had many ways of reflecting the different types of dates (not that the records are always correct -- it is complex and the standards have evolved over the hundreds of years of library metadata work (because card catalogs and journals are just a print form of metadata). :-) 

Robin Fay

[EastMarple1]

Agggh! I am sorry but this point of georgiawebgurl is just sooooo difficult to comprehend. Much too technical! Basically surely date photo taken is date associated with image on Historypin. If unsure, do not have an associated date. If have an approx. date then use a range. As for paintings, I am still not sure that they belong on Historypin. One thing I have especially found problematic with regard to paintings is artistic licence. Artists don't always paint what is actually there in front of them. My local history society found this with one painting of the village I live in and another is currently under debate. Re ghost signs I am with Jon and James on that subject.... date is date photo taken. Certainly add background notes - origins of the sign but that is all.

 

Can I highlight another problem I have recently encountered  please? Apologies as slightly off topic. I have uploaded an image of a large country house that has an unknown location, therefore unpinned to a map. I was hoping that someone may identify it for me eventually so I could discover who lived there. I find it rather frustrating that I cannot add it to a collection as it has not been pinned. To explain I have built up a large collection of photos of large country houses in the UK that I would like to add it to. And yes, another gripe of mine is that collections are much underused, cannot be searched for and can only be created via the favourites route. I seem to have accumulated far too many favourites!

 

Sarah

[Translucence]

Thanks folks, okay I'll put the official date as the "photographed" date, while listing the other dates in the description.

(For the record, that's what Robin / georgiawebgurl was saying as well - that the photographed date is the main thing but it's still important to write the other dates somewhere)

[robin aka georgiawebgurl]

Sounds great and exactly right, I'm not trying to change anything about historypin or make it more academic, but there is a precedent in terms of dates in the archival, museum, and library communities (and also among the professional photography communities as well). Those viewpoints are worth consideration because those people have spent many years building those digital communities (and yes, some are better than others) which is why I mentioned them.  :-) Apologies if I wandered off too deeply into library stuff, but I do know that many genealogists and community historians spend a great deal of time in archives and libraries there, so perhaps, I assumed a familiarity :-)

Have a great day,

Robin

@georgiawebgurl

On Mon, Jun 16, 2014 at 8:56 PM, Translucence <crs...@gmail.com> wrote:

Thanks folks, okay I'll put the official date as the "photographed" date, while listing the other dates in the description.

(For the record, that's what Robin / georgiawebgurl was saying as well - that the photographed date is the main thing but it's still important to write the other dates somewhere)

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[James Morley]

I think it's absolutely right that all sides of an issue are
considered, as long as the focus remains on the end users (both
contributors to and viewers of Historypin).

I for one have enjoyed the fact that there have been a number of good
discussions here in the group recently.

Best, James

---
James Morley
www.jamesmorley.net / @jamesinealing
www.whatsthatpicture.com / @PhotosOfThePast

On 17 June 2014 20:55, robin aka georgiawebgurl

[Jon Voss]

I second that emotion. Lots of great discussion here and it again underlines that there are a lot of different uses and needs which we're all trying to balance.

Thanks, Jon

[Translucence]

It would be great if pinned photos also showed the date they were pinned or uploaded, and that could also be searched on too.

Scenario #1

Currently I'm trying to find out if anyone apart from me is actively using HistoryPin in my very large city. I suspect I'm the only one.

Scenario #2

I'd like to see new pictures that are posted in my city.

For both of these situations, the only thing I can do is to search on photos *dated* as being in 2014 - so that means if anyone is currently posting new historic pictures of my city then I'd never know.

[Rebekkah Abraham]

Hi Christopher,

Thanks for this ideas, we agree that they are a missing element on Historypin and are working on new kinds of data and activity feeds to surface this kind of information. We are also looking at ways of having more nuanced ways of referencing date - including when people pinned it, the date(s) it belongs to, the date it was created etc.

Rebekkah

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