Model Curation

• Models are important. They are arguably more valuable than physical assets.
• Models often have uses beyond their original intent.
• Models are currently ad-hoc in terms of their location and transmission.

Think of them as a kind of IP. Things like patents and copyrights are strategically managed: they are tracked and controlled; they have a lifecycle; they can be combined to generate yet more value. But models are mostly laying around at the department level, the team level, or individual people's heads. There is no formal, universally recognized system for them the way there is for IP.

Instead, we should curate them:

Model curation is the lifecycle management, control, preservation and active enhancement of models and associated information to ensure value for current and future use, as well as repurposing beyond initial purpose and context.

There are several areas of curation which can be drawn on for examples: museum; digital; content; biomedical models. The work recommends making this a specific responsibility at the organizational level. There should be a Chief Model Curation Office at the enterprise level with a team dedicated to the purpose, including officers at the program level.

Models should have a pedigree: the origin, verification, enhancements, and uses over time should all be a part of the model object.

Source: Rhodes, D.H., "Model Curation: Requisite Leadership and Practice in Digital Engineering Enterprises," 17th Conference on Systems Engineering Research, Washington, DC, April 2019. [paper] [briefing]