Web2.0 -Tagging – Thomas Vander Wal

Thomas Vander Wal

Tagging
Taxonomy
Social Web Scaling

what is a tag?
simple meta data
used for sorting
hook for aggregatinig
identifier or description
personal marker

more than 1 tag on an object

History of tagging

Lotus Magellan – 87-90
desktop
DOS world
meta data to files and annotate, add context, not really networking
using sneakernet
handing off files
good way to add context
pull info back together
more networked world
compuserve
files and adding keywords – only 255 keywords
the sysop could replace tags – breaking the peoples means of finding that info – that they tagged
compuserve got lots of feedback from devs
really want their own metadata and keywords to keep track of what they found and added

personalization – track info back to yourself

Bitsy
signup for account and tag with URI
Cory Doctrow – MetaCrap

2003/2004 – Del.ici.ous – started and growing
flickr too
taggin in networked/web environment
what do we call this

the f word – FOLKSONOMY

apple and iphoto and add your personal tags and make them social tags
social and personal lines blurring (sometimes both sometimes just personal)
more or

tagging for those consuming the information

Value – external derived from own vocab and adding meaning

whats going on based on where and how they are brought up
will add that info
all have our own window – tagging lets us put hooks on that info

all about the individual

the less you think of what tag – the more you can retrieve and refine

removing a tag – removing one or may peoples means of getting back to info

Folksonomy triad – object, metadata, identity
most people applying perspective thru their own lens

relationship between object and ID is interest – making a specific connection

one of the three legs from the stool to pivot

vocab between community and meta and community and identity – you start opening the box to connection and definition – social networking and web begin to work

community is tagging audi things, clothing, pen sets – may or may not be interest
interest around same term
obj and relationship wiht the tag in the same manner

use communtiy and id as an anchor – using same tags on objects – algorithms doing smart search

pivots and connections used intelligently

folksonomy vs taxonomy

library sci – love tax – see folks as a threat

see folks as a threat – bottom up vs top down
what we call things across

tax expensive to build and out of date

common is the product and the obj in the middle

ID gaps in the tax – include the terms where there are gaps – look at spikes and say “Oh” makes it inclusive – find the gaps

Business Tensions
Naming control vs peoples vocab
Sample groups vs every perspective (really getting all persp. – all that you may not have considered
inhouse vs outside (home brewed vs del.icious or others)
knowd dollar value – w/ unknown dollar value

bussiness gains – internet
target message lang need and taste
opening up communication
what the interests are
explicit statement on the part of the user – i digg this – why i value this or not – better understanding of customers – pos or neg – helpful when you figure out who what when where why

Intranet
improves refindability
refinidng is hugely not being addressed issue
lacking tools – tagging tools that do it well close the gap
helps understand context – getting to common vocab
connecting silos
ease of sharing resources by perspective
similar interests and experienc over that

Scaling

COld Start Problem
need somewhere to start
Scaling and FUnctionality
people vs times object tagged
many people tagging with few times – dont see scaling – not that useful
few people with many things – skewed perspective
a. works for personal use – delicious lesson – maintain bookmarks and annotate and refine
social tools dont work well beyond
b Serendipity – not perfect tool, not more mature
c Powerful – search working, seeing trends

Phases of interaction
saving and tagging
refinding
clicking pivoting

Personal to Social

As much of 28% of people on the web has taggged

shfit from gen categorization to actual tagging
trends similar to rss
more powerful – beyond alphas to 2nd stage adopters

why tag?
Reasons people tag?
Own value
Add perspective context
refindability
State of interest
Sociality

Biggest reasons – own value and refindability

Spheres of Sociality
Personal (web services, things that matter)
Selective (we are selective vs everyone here – people we

Tools need all 4 layers when in dev phase

Social Context
Personal – Capture
Social – Share
Hook/Copy – Point
Annotate – COllab
Refins – Filter
Privacy – trusted groups

Shape of Tags
where do people tag
social – deliv
viddler – tag at certain bookmarks – in video

Wherever there is a digital obj or marker – they are tagging
People using tag services
tagging
descriptions – and long free text annotation – more than just tags, feeds to info, interfaces to diff svces

commas work well for western euro lang – others dont have that delimeter – text box for each item works well

scanning is big with tags

collective approach – when you look at selective – seeing contacts of people you know with perspective similar to your own

what the collective vs mob vs your network can reduce the tsunami

groups another way to filter, segment

filtering and clustering – flickr does well – find things similar and grouping

tag combinations – raw sugaar – takes trad taxonomy and clusters together – adding and defining context

helps to filter

Library thing – culture – variations and related info (related based on community?)

algorithmic approach – interestingness from flickr

Tag Cloud
not overly fond of tag cloud – dont work well with real people
notfinding relevance – wont come back to the site – nothing of interest – flat list works better – easier for pattern matching

tag clouds best work on granular items

works really well as descriptor

SHopping – Amazon – art of the pivot done well

discomusic.com top pick

people can find recommendations this entity has and works well – nav the amazon site and get rep points

tagging is a feature not focus – secondary order of functionality

Easy tagging with amazon
– taggin is yes no

What Is Going On
I want social web and tagging
kevin federline page on amazon
person making a social statement

talentless page on amazon

Improvements – things not going well yet
value of tagging for non taggers
volatility of tag objects
tethering needed
when we point to things and change them (updated, changed,) – what happens – pointed to similar, or archives

Social Networking – broadline friends
Interoperability – desktop, laptop, push to delicious, flickr
Tag Commons – meta data do we need and looking at interop more successfully