> > ... your FPI looks a whole lot like a Sears FPI; it appears
> > to be in Sears space. What is the source of your right to create a
> > name within Sears space?
>
> I didn't create it. Sears did, when it published its 1922 Farm
> Catalog.
Not so. Sears created a catalog in 1922, but not an FPI.
In any event, I think I understand the source of our disagreements.
As I (and Chris Maden, apparently) read the owner-identifier in FPIs,
it is the creator of the name, not of the thing named, that
appears there. Apparently you disagree:
> So, there must be many occasions when formal public identifiers, or
> something like them (and URNs, or something like them) will need to be
> created by persons who lack any special authority to create them.
> They must include the name of the authority that created, published,
> or is otherwise associated with the referenced information.
This seems to clearly indicate that for you an FPI is like a
bibliography entry: it holds the publisher, the format, the title,
and the language of the publication. Anybody can create one as
long as they tell the truth.
For me, an FPI is a name assigned by a namer (which can be anyone),
and its parts are the namer, the format, the assigned name, and the
language. I can name anything if I list myself as the namer, but
I cannot concoct names listing someone else as the namer, any more
than I can create an ISBN for a book I publish that has the wrong
publisher prefix.
> If FPIs and/or URNs should *not* be used for referencing offline
> information produced by unregistered authorities, then what should?
They should be so used, but not as you propose using them, I think.
-- John Cowan http://www.ccil.org/~cowan cowan@ccil.org You tollerday donsk? N. You tolkatiff scowegian? Nn. You spigotty anglease? Nnn. You phonio saxo? Nnnn. Clear all so! 'Tis a Jute.... (Finnegans Wake 16.5)