Subject: info: IPTC starts testing the News Revolution

From: "Laurent Le Meur" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 15:13:19 +0100

IPTC starts testing the News Revolution

Windsor (United Kingdom), 10 January 2006 -- Sharing and accurately 
describing news will take a giant leap forward this month when 
testing begins on NewsML 2 Architecture, a proposed standard from 
the International Press Telecommunications Council for a next 
generation of news exchange formats.
 
Developed by a consortium of more than 40 of the world's major news 
agencies and news system vendors, NewsML 2 Architecture is based on 
the wildly popular XML markup language.
 
The basic goal of the NewsML 2 Architecture is to provide a single 
generic model for exchanging all kinds of newsworthy information.
Not only will this give news agencies and software developers a 
unified method for handling news, but it will also provide an XML 
framework for a future family of IPTC news exchange standards 
covering such diverse specialties as sports, entertainment and 
financial news.
 
Under the IPTC model, text, photo, graphics, video -- in fact, any 
combination of media types -- can be bundled into packages that 
neatly wrap the news content, information about the content and a 
management layer.  Senders can make the XML wrapper as simple or 
complex as desired, tailoring the final package to the exact needs 
of their customers.
 
As with all IPTC standards, when work is completed NewsML 2 standards
will be released for use without payment or royalties.  In addition, 
it is compatible with the World Wide Web Consortium's "Semantic Web" 
framework, building a robust universal data exchange using XML and 
other standard tools.
 
During the testing period, IPTC members and other parties can:
 
-  Test "real life" use cases against the News Architecture model 
   and syntax.
-  Report on practical issues. 
-  Help finalise the NewsML 2 Architecture specifications. 
 
NewsML 2 Architecture Version 1.0, Experimental Phase 1, will end on 
15 February 2006.  Although testing is generally intended for IPTC 
members, non-members may be invited to join.  All documents and 
specification files for the current draft of the NewsML 2 
Architecture are available at www.iptc.org/dev .
 
To discuss participation or possible IPTC membership, non-members can
write to [email-masked].
 
Test results will be discussed at the next regular meeting of the 
IPTC, to be held in Vancouver, Canada, in March 2006; results will 
also be published on the IPTC's web site, http://www.iptc.org/ .
 
The IPTC, based in Windsor, England, is a consortium of the world's 
major news agencies, news publishers and news industry vendors.  It 
develops and maintains technical standards that are used by virtually
every major news organization in the world. 
 
More information may be had from the IPTC at [email-masked] .

Laurent
Head of Medialab, AFP, www.afp.com
Chair, NewsML 2 Architecture WP, IPTC, www.iptc.org/dev

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