What it is vs. how we shall: complementary agendas for data models and architectures
David S. Dubin, Megan Senseney, Jacob Jett · Balisage series on markup technologies · 2013
Data models play two kinds of role in information interchange. Descriptively, they offer domain models. Prescriptively, they propose plans of action. While stipulative definitions fill in a model's representational gaps, elegance and descriptive power reduce the need for arbitrary choices in standards and specifications. Proposals for modeling digital annotation serve to illustrate competing representational and cohortative agendas.