**Aim and Scope**

The aim of the Special Track is to bring together researchers from the broad areas of digital libraries, information retrieval, linked data and online social networking who are interested in communicating and sharing novel research approaches to the implementation of metadata, ontologies and semantics in this context.

Modern approaches to metadata, ontologies and semantics have revolutionized the design and implementation of Digital Libraries and Information Retrieval Systems, while they have made possible the management, analysis and querying of big volumes of heterogeneous data, both structured (linked data) and unstructured (e.g. social data, open data, or social networking interactions). Despite the benefits of these technologies for end users, like improved interaction with information, or better search, interpretation and sharing of data; yet there are many metadata and semantic challenges that need to be overcome in order to improve the user experience. These challenges are multi-dimensional in nature and could span from system architecture and data modeling to user interface design and evaluation, including: the implementation of linked data models in Digital Libraries, the design and evaluation of information retrieval algorithms across heterogeneous collections of structured and unstructured data; the integration, mapping and interoperability of heterogeneous linked data models and ontologies; analysis of social data for the discovery of trends and future predictions; or social network analysis.

**Topics**

Topics include but are not limited to contributions dealing with the following issues:
*Ontologies and knowledge representation
*Metadata standards, schemas and application profiles
*Metadata and Liked data models
*Metadata and semantic interoperability
*Metadata and Ontology management
*Linked data, data management and linking of heterogeneous datasets
*Social Data management and analysis
*Social Networking and Collaboration platforms
*Metadata and Semantics for Social Machines
*Metadata, semantics and ontologies for storage and retrieval of information (e.g. digital libraries, institutional repositories, search engines, social information seeking, data-mining and information retrieval systems)
*Metadata, semantics and ontologies for digital object curation, provenance and content preservation
*Metadata Provenance
*Metadata and semantics for different information seeking life-cycles (e,g, searching, evaluating, using and sharing information)
*Metrics and Quality issues for metadata and semantics (methods, measures)
*Evaluation methodologies for metadata, semantics, ontologies and linked data
*Human Computer Interaction and User Research in metadata and ontology design and development.
*Comparative studies (auto generated versus human generated metadata and semantics)
*Accessibility, profiling and content personalisation
*Semantics in the design of Digital Library architectures and infrastructures
*Knowledge representation and information visualisation
*Decision support for Digital Libraries and Information Retrieval Systems
*Collaborative filtering & recommender systems
*Big social data
*Big data best practices

**Important Dates**

*July 10th 2017: Paper submission deadline (extended)
*July 31 st , 2017: Notification of acceptance
*August 27 th , 2017: Camera-ready papers due
*November 28th –December 1st , 2017: Conference in Tallinn University, Tallinn (Estonia)


**Paper Submissions**

Interested authors can submit to https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=mtsr2017

The following types of presentation are invited:
*Full papers (12 pages) reporting complete research
*Short papers (6 pages) presenting ongoing or preliminary research
*Posters (4 pages)

Papers should be original and not previously submitted to other Conferences or Journals. All submissions will be reviewed on the basis of relevance, originality, importance and clarity following a double-blind peer review process. Submissions associated by any MTSR member (e.g. Chairs and PC members of MTSR or any of its Tracks) will follow a double-blind peer review process by an independent review committee.

Submitted papers have to follow the LNCS proceedings formatting style and guidelines. Authors of accepted papers will be asked to register to the Conference and present their work in the form of either oral presentation or poster presentation. The Conference welcomes Workshops and Tutorial on any issues concerning the main themes of MTSR such as metadata, ontologies, Semantic Web, knowledge management, software engineering and digital libraries.


**Conference Proceedings**

Proceedings will be published by Springer in Vol. 755 of the Communications in Computer and Information Science (CCIS) book series. CCIS is abstracted/indexed in Scopus, SCImago, EI-Compendex, Mathematical Reviews, DBLP, Google Scholar. CCIS volumes are also submitted for the inclusion in ISI Proceedings.


**Other Publication Opportunities**

Selected papers might be considered for a revised and extended version to be published in a range of international journals, including the International Journal of Metadata, Semantics and Ontologies (Inderscience) and Program (Emerald).


**Awards**
There are two types of awards: the Best Paper Award and the Best Student Paper Award, both sponsored by euroCRIS.

*Best paper award: This award will be presented to the authors of the best full research paper submitted and presented at the conference.
*Best student paper award: MTSR sponsors a paper competition to recognize excellence in a conference paper contribution whose primary author is a student (normally at a PhD or MRes level). The student is required to present the paper at the MTSR 2017 conference.
Submissions are evaluated on their originality, scientific merits, structure, and clarity of composition.


**Special Track Chairs**

*Emmanouel Garoufallou, Alexander Technological Educational Institute (TEI) of Thessaloniki, GREECE
*Rania Siatri, Alexander Technological Educational Institute (ATEI) of Thessaloniki, Greece
*Sirje Virkus, Tallinn University, Estonia


**Program Committee**

*Panos Balatsoukas, University of Manchester, UK
*Ozgu Can, Ege University, Turkey
*Sissi Closs, Karlsruhe University of Applied Sciences, Germany
*Mike Conway, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA
*Phil Couch, University of Manchester, UK
*Milena Dobreva, University of Malta, Malta
*Ali Emrouznejad, Aston University, UK
*Panorea Gaitanou, Ionian University, Greece
*Jane Greenberg, Drexel University, USA
*R. J. Hartley, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK
*Nikos Korfiatis, University of East Anglia, UK
*Rebecca Koskela, University of New Mexico, USA
*Valentini Moniarou-Papaconstantinou, Technological Educational Institute of Athens, Greece
*Dimitris Rousidis, University of Alcala, Spain
*Athena Salaba, Kent State University, USA
*Miguel-Angel Sicilia, University of Alcala, Spain
*Christine Urquhart, Aberystwyth University, UK
*Evgenia Vassilakaki, Technological educational Institute of Athens, Greece
*Sirje Virkus, Tallinn University, Estonia
*Georgia Zafeiriou, University of Macedonia, Greece