# Re: URN Usage

Rob Raisch, The Internet Company (raisch@internet.com)
Thu, 16 Sep 1993 23:20:16 -0700 (PDT)

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    Date: Thu, 16 Sep 1993 23:20:16 -0700 (PDT)

    From: "Rob Raisch, The Internet Company" <raisch@internet.com>

    Subject: Re: URN Usage

    To: Uniform Resource Identifier discussion <uri@bunyip.com>

    In-Reply-To: <9309170427.AA05008@mocha.bunyip.com>

    Message-Id: <Pine.3.03.9309162316.B5114-c100000@hmmm.internet.com>

Ummm... perhaps I am simply being dense, but I had thought that we had
gotten beyond the issue of what an intellectual property is. My
definition and your definition may indeed diverge, and that is largely
irrelevant to the topic of URNs -- since a URN does not refer to any
intellectual property.

A URN is a reference to a property or resource which a publisher wishes to
make available to the community. A URN does not reference an intellectual
property, since such a thing only exists in the minds of lawyers.

A URN is really a UPN -- Uniform Product Name(tm) -- since it refers to
whatever the publisher would like it to. We have no say in the matter.
It's up to the entity which maintains control over the property.

Versioning is fine and dandy, but only in the abstract. How would you
enforce on the publisher the requirement that a particular version of a
product requires a new UPN? What metric would you apply to differentiate
versions? Would the correction of a typo be a new version and necessitate
a new UPN?

We really need to stop running around wrangling with abstract concepts and
get something done. I for one would like to see a URN scheme which had a
number of usable features that could be used simply to differentiate one
*product* from another. (In fact, I suggested such a scheme quite some time
ago which generated almost no comment whatsoever. Not sour grapes, mind
you. Just a very tired mind, up late at night, watching people argue over
details which will never be used.)

But what we do not need is some ivory tower abstract construct which the
publisher will never use because it offers no value whatsoever. "I'm
sorry, Woof and Wattlesford, but that URN is illegal because the third
word of the second sentence has changed from the previous version."
The publisher replies "Well, we'd like to, you see, but we'd rather sell
information. Thanks for your interest, though."

What it looks like it immaterial. What it refers to is not up to us.
What it does is point to a unique instance of a product, where the
uniqueness is in the mind of the owner.

</rr>

(Of course, everything here is opinion. Your mileage may vary.)

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