Re: [urn] Revised registration request for URN:NAN

Hello Lauri,

Thank you for this note and for the updated registration request. I 
approve of registration. Once we hear back from other members of the 
expert review team, I can work with you on a few small editorial matters 
and ask IANA to complete the registration.

Peter

On 8/1/23 9:59 AM, KA Urnnan wrote:
> Dear recipients,
> 
> Thank you all for an elightening conversation and on-point corrections 
> to the registration request, and apologies for the tardiness of my 
> reply; I was on vacation, and due to technical equipment failure was 
> unable to access my work email. I have amended the request according to 
> the helpful suggestions. Please find  the resubmission attached.
> 
> On a general note, I could try to conceptualize the difference between 
> NBN and NAN. The main difference stems from the identified material 
> itself, and reflects the well established practices of division of 
> responsibility between libraries and archives. While the NBN is assigned 
> to published material that does not have publisher-issued identifier and 
> concerns mainly works of literary/bookish nature (e.g. master’s theses, 
> ephemera), the NAN will be assigned to archival material. Or in other 
> words unique, unpublished and often non-literary (in the strict sense) 
> primary sources (e.g. letters, charters, minutes, manuscripts, maps, 
> drawings, etc.). While NBN could be assigned to e.g. a self-published 
> autobiography lacking an ISBN, and it would identify the (in FRBR terms) 
> work-expression-manifestation -levels, NANs could be assigned to the 
> work’s authorial working manuscript and notes associated to it, and 
> similar item-level objects (again in FRBR-terms). In other words, there 
> should be not much conceptual or factual overlap in the material that 
> NBN and NAN refer to. The other main difference lies in the organisation 
> of materials. Archival sources are organised into hierarchical structure 
> consisting of archival entities, series and units, all of which can be 
> given unique identifiers. Thus the resource which is identified with a 
> NAN number is very much different from that identified with a NBN number.
> 
> Mainly for these conceptual reasons the NBN as identifier for archival 
> material is out of the question. It has well established and defined 
> usage which does not lend itself for use with archival sources. 
> Assigning NBN’s for our material would only create confusion in the 
> field. The only main exception (that I can think of) to the division of 
> material described above concerns some older historical sources, mainly 
> of literary nature (e.g. late medieval manuscripts and letters). Such 
> material can be found in both libraries’ and archives’ collections for 
> historical reasons. Yet, this material has only rarely been assigned any 
> NBN:s, and the overlap remains therefore minimal in terms of magnitude 
> as well as conceptually. Since the practices between archives and 
> libaries are well established, I found it unnecessary to list this as a 
> restriction in the registration. While it leaves open the definition of 
> pertinent material, this might also mean that URN:NAN could help to fill 
> in the gaps left by URN:NBN in the identification of archival 
> collections in libraries. It also leaves the door open for national 
> archives to implement their own practices as they see fit. Hopefully 
> this attempt of clarification answers at least some of the questions raised.
> 
> Regarding the informational RFC: at the moment I would personally see it 
> as an overextension of preliminary definitions. Once URN:NAN has been 
> implemented by us and at least a few other national archives, however, I 
> believe it would be definitely useful to write one. At that point in 
> time we would have experience of usage, understanding of the most 
> pertinent questions, borderline cases and problems encountered, and 
> would be the better able to formulate necessary clarifications to using 
> URN:NAN.
> 
> Looking forward to hearing from you,
> 
> Best regards,
> 
> Lauri Leinonen
> 
> 
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