Metadata in Mexican Television News Broadcasts on the Web

To increase visibility and maintain return on investment of television news broadcasts (“digital property”, as termed in the television industry), web distribution is needed in addition to television broadcasts. This paper presents the results of a study on the use of metadata within Mexican television stations, analyzing those that fulfill a relevant function for representation and thematic retrieval on the web. Action Research was selected for the study, which assessed 14 Mexican television stations for a six-month period in 2015: three to identify metadata use and three to carry out an intervention. One of the findings shows that television stations use Content Management Systems to automatically assign basic metadata such as newscast title, news item date, broadcasting schedule and anchors. Other metadata that describe subject matter are, however, incorporated ambiguously or insufficiently. The evaluation showed the need to apply new methodologies for analysis and video documentary treatment so as to refine content description and representation. The intervention made it possible to demonstrate the viability of increasing search engine relevance, along with visibility, web positioning and access.