DCMI Open Metadata Clinic

October 21, 2025 | University of Barcelona

The DCMI Open Metadata Clinic will be a first-of-its-kind gathering of international metadata stakeholders from across the research, education and cultural heritage communities. 

Metadata is essential to aggregation, assessment, bibliometrics, citation, collection development, description, discovery, and more. However, while there is worldwide attention and much progress being made on the other “opens,” the critical role of metadata is often overlooked. This event will focus on the growing movement towards open metadata—metadata that is free from access, use and reuse restrictions—as a vital complement to open access, open data, open education and open science. 

Questions about the rights status of metadata (i.e., copyright, contracts and licensing) as well as simple ambiguity about metadata provenance often cloud metadata use and reuse, creating a chilling effect on innovation and services. Further, efforts from some quarters to privatize metadata are imposing new barriers, even as global trends towards open science and open research information (reflected in the Barcelona Declaration on Open Research Information) take root. 

The Open Metadata Clinic is geared towards institutional leaders, policy makers, metadata practitioners, funders, digital infrastructures, and commercial service providers, with individual invitations being issued to national archives, libraries and museums. Building on the groundbreaking OMLOS (Open Metadata; Libraries in Open Science) international academic seminar held at the National Library of Korea from May 12-13, 2025, this daylong event will highlight the value of open metadata and explore collaborative pathways toward metadata openness.

Sessions will focus on:

1. Case Studies demonstrating the opportunities and challenges for open metadata in different domains: articles, books, cultural heritage and datasets.
2. Institutional Policies for open metadata from national, academic, research information organizations and funding agencies.
3. Economic Models for open metadata, highlighting pathways for a vibrant, sustainable metadata ecosystem and services that leverage and enrich open metadata.  
4. Intellectual Property, Contractual and Other Legal Concerns around metadata, including barriers and best practices in terms and approaches.
5. Lightning Talks and Mixers for projects, initiatives and practitioners in the open metadata space in order to promote awareness of and foster connections among players in this broad front and accelerate progress in all domains. 

Questions? Contact dcmi-open-metadata@lists.stanford.edu.