normative Doc ID: `VIDSEO-DOC-GOVERNANCE` · Reference 1.0.0 · non-executable

Governance

Versioning, change control, review policy, and consistency rules for the VidSEO reference repository.

The purpose of governance is simple: keep VidSEO's meaning stable across time and surfaces.

Content classes

This repository uses three content classes:

• normative: defines meaning, scope, exclusions, or required rules,
• informative: explains or contextualizes without redefining meaning,
• contextual: points to external resources or adjacent material.

A page must never silently shift from informative to normative intent.

Stable identifiers

Once published, these identifiers should remain stable:

• document IDs (VIDSEO-DOC-*),
• term IDs (VIDSEO-TERM-*),
• term codes (VIDSEO-T-*),
• canonical slugs where external links may already exist.

Change classes

Patch

Typo fixes, wording clarification, metadata cleanup, or layout improvements with no meaning change.

Minor

New informative material, new term pages, added translations, or expanded machine surfaces without changing core scope.

Major

Any change to:

• product definition,
• authority hierarchy,
• non-goals,
• interpretability boundary,
• canonical URL strategy.

Major changes require a version bump, changelog entry, and full consistency review.

Drift control requirements

If a change affects product meaning or canonical discovery, contributors must update as needed:

• VERSION
• CHANGELOG.md
• meta.json
• ai-manifest.json
• links.json
• data/documents.json
• data/terms.json
• data/capabilities.json
• llms.txt
• sitemap.xml

Review rule

No contribution should be merged if it introduces:

• ranking promises,
• citation promises,
• hidden AI capability claims,
• unexplained authority changes,
• broken machine surfaces,
• untranslated canonical navigation when bilingual parity is required.

Maintainer model

Final authority for normative meaning remains with the maintainer of the canonical surfaces.