Glossary of Metadata Terms

International Organization of Standards (ISO) - an independent, non-governmental organization founded in 1947 "to facilitate the international coordination and unification of industrial standards." It is the largest developer of voluntary international standards, and the organization has published more than 19,000 international standards covering most aspects of technology and business. Organizational membership is made up of national standards bodies in approximately 130 countries. ISO-approved standards, such as ISBN, have been developed and tested by an expert technical committee consensus process to ensure their efficacy for international business transactions. When a standard has been ISO-approved, industries have assurance that when they provide electronic information conforming to the standard it will be consistently received and understood by business partners worldwide.

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) -
A unique 8-digit code, ISSN is the international identifier for print and electronic serial publications such as newspapers, magazines, and other continuing resource of all kinds. As opposed to stand-alone books (monographs), serials are issued on a regular basis and have the same title (The New York Times, for example) but different content. The ISSN allows all the different issues of a serial publication to be reliably tracked, retrieved, and displayed. The ISSN International Centre was created in Paris in 1976 under the terms of an agreement between UNESCO and France, the host country. The ISSN International Centre coordinates the ISSN assignment and management activities of 88 member countries.

Metadata Best Practices - A best practice is a technique or method that consistently shows superior results and that is therefore used as an industry benchmark. Adoption of best practices is generally voluntary, but is encouraged by industries to promote efficiency and consistency in business and technology practices across multiple participants, systems, and business transactions. The North American publishing industry looks to Best Practices for Product Metadata, developed by the BISG Metadata Committee in coordination with BookNet Canada, for book metadata guidelines and recommendations.