The AUTOI project is creating a virtual communication resource overlay with autonomic characteristics to adapt the services and resources offered to meet changing user needs, business goals, and environmental conditions. Self-knowledge enables the network to reconfigure itself in the face of change to adapt its services according to business goals. The requirements of an information model, to support self-knowledge (concepts, characteristics and behaviour) are presented. This information model plus ontologies provide a common language to represent the self-management of the overlay. This position paper details the requirements in specifying such an information model and language, and describes how the model and language will be used within the project.