The ComicsPRO Metadata Working Group has launched a helpline to identify, track and suggest solutions for comics metadata problems, the group announced.  The new helpline builds on the white paper and the initial metadata standards for comics, the Comet Standard, released by the group at the ComicsPRO Annual Meeting earlier this year (see "Comics Metadata Standard").

The Working Group is asking retailers and other users of comics metadata to report data errors to the group, which will be tracked and recorded as the group attempts to address and resolve the problem.  The helpline will initially be staffed by Brian Garside of Manage Comics and Django Bohren of ComicShop Assistant.

Working Group chair Katie Pryde explained the genesis of the new helpline.  "The objective of developing the Comics Industry COMET Standard White Paper and Implementation Guide was to create a set of metadata standards that everyone in the industry could move toward adopting," she said.  "But while that adoption is underway, we are in a sort of gap period: we know where we need to be, and we know where we are, but we don’t have a clear path between them.  And, meanwhile, each month’s catalog data brings a new set of problems. We realized that we needed a bridge."