Roxanna's recent message has called that effort into question. In the meantime, work on Internet ratings has been proceeding. Therefore, unless there are objections, I will submit the draft charter below to Harald and John to get the group formation process going. These descriptions, known as URCs, will take two forms - descriptions of known resources and descriptions of desired resources. Such descriptions form the basis for a broad range of useful applications.
Bibliographic databases are a familiar example.
Two similar applications are a service to track multiple locations for a resource, and a service to provide ratings information on resources for the purposes of information filtering. The URC specification shall provide the standardization necessary to allow the maximum of interoperability between such applications, along with related applications dealing with the creation, use, and destruction of information. While the applications have similarities, there will be enough differences that no one choice of transport protocol, syntax, or attribute set will be universally appropriate. The URC-WG will coordinate its activities with other working groups, such as those considering URNs and standard bibliographic descriptions. We expect that seperate standards-track documents will be produced on the conveyance of URCs in those protocols, although such documents are not directly the purpose of this group.