<< Click to Display Table of Contents >> Navigation:  DOI System Governance and Participation > DOI System Participants: Registration Agencies and Registrants > Roles of a Registration Agency

A Registration Agency (RA) provides services to one or several communities of users. A community is loosely defined, but could be any group of parties sharing a common application or interest, under any organizational structures (public, private sector, not-for profit, regulator, etc).

The services an RA provides to their users include:

•allocating prefixes

•registering DOI names and providing the necessary infrastructure to allow registrants to declare and maintain DOI metadata and DOI record (in other words, use of the DOI System)

•services not directly involving the DOI System which add value, for example: management of a database of related data with facilities for look-up from metadata to DOI name

The role of an RA could also encompass any of the following activities:

•providing information and advice to the community

•providing applications, services, marketing, outreach, business cases etc. to introduce the DOI System to the community

•designing and implementing specific operational processes, for example: quality control of input data and output data

•integrating the community into other DOI related activities and services