Information lifecycles

One of the purposes of metadata is to manage the capture, storage, distribution and use of information resources. This can be done in a variety of contexts: libraries, records collections, archives, research data repositories and multimedia collections. As well as formal collections, metadata also plays an important role in the organisation of personal collections, such as bibliographic references, social media and personal files.

The concept of an information lifecycle is widely used in the management of digital resources and particularly for preservation. There are identifiable stages in the life of a digital resource and this provides a basis for managing those resources. Detlor (2010) puts forward a process-based view of information management where the number of steps in the information lifecycle depends on the perspective taken (organisational, library, or personal). This is an idea that is also summarised in Floridi's (2010) overview of Information. Although metadata does not refer exclusively to digital information (it is also used for books and other physical manifestations of information) the majority of examples discussed here are electronic. These include websites, electronic document and records management systems, data repositories and social media. The lifecycle concept is well developed in records management and this is reflected in ISO15489-1:2016, the international standard for records management, which emphasises events in the lifecycle of records: