I would like the metadata specialists who create metadata for digital projects around the state to have a discussion on their practices for adding subject or geographic metadata to digital collections, specifically on whether or not you attempt some form of authority control. Some questions for discussion: Do you assign subject headings or keywords to digital objects? Do you use formal thesauri or controlled vocabularies and/or local keywords or some combination of all of the above? Do you attempt to control your local keywords? Do you try to control vocabulary across collections? Do you use the controlled vocabulary features of your content management software or do you have an external way of doing so? Have you ever used vocabulary management software like Tema Trace? Do you even consider control of terms to be necessary for search/discovery for small digital projects?

– Dana Caudle