1.
Tagging
Gene Smith
CanUX 2007 • Banff, Alberta

2.
“When the hype wears down... I think
tagging will have altered the information
landscape in a fundamental way”
- Jon Udell

3.
Tagging is...
• Simple, flexible, extensible
• Quick
• Social
• Collaborative

4.
Social
Information
Software
Architecture
Computer-mediated
Organizing info so
collaboration and
others can find it
sharing
Tagging
Social metadata
Personal Information
Management
Organizing your information to get
things done

5.
User Resource
Tags
Tagging System

6.
“When the hype wears down... I think
tagging will have altered the information
landscape in a fundamental way”
- Jon Udell

7.
vs.

8.
Volume
Time

9.
Volume
Time
?

10.
Landscape
• Static ➔ Dynamic
• Low(er) Volume ➔ High(er) Volume
• Localized ➔ Ubiquitous and Immersive
• Centralized ➔ Distributed
• Authoritarian ➔ Social

11.
“Believe it or not, we are all becoming
librarians... “
“As the Internet provides users with the
freedom to publish information, it quietly
burdens them with the responsibility to
organize that information”
- Peter Morville & Lou Rosenfeld

12.
Five Motivations
• Ease of Use
• Personal Information Management
• Collaboration and Sharing
• Fun
• Self Expression

13.
Exercise
• Tag vase with
• Tag vase with
stickies stickies
• Fold them in half
• Place them on the
outside
• Place them inside

14.
Social Tagging
• Social Hum
• Object-centered sociality
• Lowered barriers to participation
• User-generated Innovation

15.
1 2

16.
Community
Community
Article
Article
submission
submission
Creating ' broadcast'
Creating ' broadcast'
content (messageboards)
content (messageboards)
Short commenting (eBay
reviews; Friends Reunited)
Votes/polls and tagging
Reading web content, 'sending to a friend'
Reading web content
© BBC 2005
Current steps to participation Possible steps to participation

17.
Geotagging
• Marker tag
• “geotagged”
• Two machine tags
• “geo:lat=54.5213”
• “geo:long=-113.1323”

18.
upcoming:event=171852
namespace : predicate = value
clothing:size=quot;largequot;
blog:via=quot;http://atomiq.orgquot;
dc:title=quot;Taggingquot;
geo:long=113.132

19.
Read/Write Web
• Simple read/write system for web
applications:
• RSS feeds for every tag
• Tag any resource
• Your web application is a database!
• User-generated innovation

20.
Exercise
• Discuss tagging patterns
• Your observations
• Questions

21.
Antisocial Tagging
• Cold-start Problem
• Messy Metadata
• Vocal Minority
• Bad Actors

22.
Puff Sean
= = = =
Diddy P. Diddy Puffy
Daddy Combs
Slim Marshall
= =
Eminem Shady Mathers
Preferred Alternate
Term Terms

23.
parent
child child

24.
Trends
• More structure
• Better visualizations
• Better algorithms
• Niche solutions

25.
Thanks!
Available December 27
Pre-order now!
Book site: http://genesmith.ca

26.
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