Alexandria, VA – February 19, 2008- PRISM (Publishing Requirements for Industry Standard Metadata), an IDEAlliance Working Group, today announces the availability of the new PRISM 2.0 Specifications. The PRISM 2.0 Specifications can be downloaded from http://www.prismstandard.org/specifications.

In 1999, IDEAlliance founded the PRISM Working Group to address emerging publisher requirements to utilize standardized metadata to facilitate content management, aggregation, and search. Since that time, the PRISM metadata framework has been broadly implemented by both magazine and journal publishers. PRISM 2.0 is the first major revision in the specification since its initial release in 2001. This major revision addresses new requirements for publishers and media companies to deliver content in an online and multimedia environment, as well as in print.

According to Lee Vetten, McGraw-Hill Business Information Group‘s Co-Chair of the PRISM Working Group, “PRISM 2.0 heralds a new generation for PRISM. Today’s magazine publishers have made a dramatic shift to delivering eMedia-based content online as well as traditional print magazines. The development of PRISM 2.0 reflects the commitment of the PRISM Working Group to mirror today’s new publishing models in the specification.” Erin Clark, Co-Chair of the PRISM Working Group from Time Inc. noted, "Based on focus groups conducted during 2006, we have undertaken an aggressive update of the PRISM Specification to address content that appears online, in some cases before it is cast in print. In addition, we have extended PRISM to address more media formats and have redesigned and enhanced our controlled vocabularies to provide for more sophisticated metadata encoding based on delivery media, presentation format, and genre."

One of the major changes in PRISM 2.0 is the inclusion of a new compliance profile for PRISM XMP. Until this time, the use of PRISM metadata was limited to XML / RDF environments. The new PRISM XMP profile (profile three), provides publishers with the capability to embed PRISM metadata, described using Adobe XMP, directly into multimedia objects that are critical to magazine publishing.

"The addition of PRISM XMP Profile enables publishing companies to apply PRISM metadata to their PDF archives for the first time," said Gunar Penikis, senior product manager for XMP at Adobe. "The new XMP profile also allows media companies using Adobe Creative Suite 3 software to apply PRISM metadata to multiple media assets, not just the text of magazine articles."

With the release of the PRISM 2.0 Specification, the Working Group is also re-releasing the PRISM Aggregator Message Guide. The PRISM Aggregator Message, or PAM, is a standard format for publishers to use in transmitting XML content to aggregators and syndicators. PAM defines a message to transmit articles coded in XML and is supported by a new PAM 2.0 XML DTD and XML XSD.