Tim Talks Tagging
Tim, the curator of LibraryThing, has a mega-post about tagging. Tim compares the tagging systems of Amazon and LibraryThing and postulates why LibraryThing users have applied ten times
the number of tags that Amazon users have, even though the number of
LibraryThing users is so much smaller than Amazon users. Tim goes on to
offer advice as to how to make an eCommerce tagging work (with a hint
that perhaps it is not too late for Amazon can catch up if they can
scrape together about $5.76)
Tim talks about the problem with 'opinion tags' especially when tagging is light. Tim points to the difference in tags for Ann Coulter's book 'Terrorism' - Amazon has user tags like "craptacular," "evil" and "brain dead while LibraryThing's has tags like 20th century(1) 21st c.(1) america 1975-present(1) American History(1) cold war(2) commentary(2) Conservatism- I find it interesting that none of the LibraryThing tags are opinion based, while almost all of Amazon's tags are. I think this may point more to a cultural difference between LibraryThing and Amazon's users. Amazon has a long history of cultivating a culture of critique. Amazon users are accustomed to and encouraged to offer their opinions about everything they see on Amazon. Amazon's customers write reviews, they rate products, they make lists of products that they recommend. With this culture of critique it is not surprising that Amazon's tags are opinion-centered. LibraryThing, on the other hand, is more oriented toward people who want to organize their book collections. With this culture of organization, we see tags that are more subject-oriented. Amazon's tags are essentially one word reviews, while LibraryThings are one word descriptions.
Tim talks about why people tag without using the word selfish. I think the best tagging systems (last.fm, delicious, and LibraryThing come to mind) work well because the prime motivation for tagging is a selfish one - people tag to organize their personal stuff (whether it is music, the web, or books). A system like last.fm or LibraryThing aggregates these thousands of selfish behaviors for the good of all.
It's clear from Tim's post that Tim spends a lot of
time thinking about tagging. I'm guessing that it is Tim's passion
for tagging that is at the heart of the success of LibraryThing.
Tim is asking a lot of interesting questions about tagging - and he has
the luxury of being able to try out his theories about tagging on a site
with hundreds of thousands of users and millions and millions of
tags - that is a luxury that very few people have.
Posted by Jeremy P on February 20, 2007 at 09:40 PM EST #
Posted by toby murdock on February 21, 2007 at 10:12 AM EST #
Posted by Paul on February 21, 2007 at 01:09 PM EST #
Posted by Paul on February 21, 2007 at 01:33 PM EST #
But I still need to hear a more convincing story told, something other than "really interesting tags emerge", with "all sorts of interesting possibilities". I am not saying this with any sort of criticism; I just really want to understand what we think really will emerge...or what has emerged already from tagging sites like Flickr. (I'm not exactly sure what you mean by LOTR radio.)
Because on the one hand, I share some of this optimism. Even for a very personal tag like "danceteaching", it could very well be that someone else finds my tag useful, and I therefore find someone else's tag useful. Given a large enough body of people using the tag "danceteaching", something interesting could come out.
But on the other hand, I do not share this optimism. When I think about a tag like danceteaching (or 'seen live' or whatever), that has so many different meanings. Are they talking about ballroom? Square dancing? Capoeira? Salsa? Hula? And even when they are talking about ballroom, do they mean foxtrot? Waltz? Tango, quickstep, rumba, cha cha, jive, etc? And even if they mean, say, "ballroom cha cha, breaking (in the international style) on 2, rather than in the American style on 1 (the music is indeed slightly different), what can I conclude from that? What user community can I create from that? I think about my 6-7 fellow dance instructors back in Massachusetts, all the people that would have labeled such a song with a "break on 2 international ballroom cha cha dance instruction" label, and then I think about the music in the rest of their collection. And I probably don't want to listen to much of it, if any. One guy likes country. One likes electronica. Another woman is into sappy ballads. So what community are we going to form around this "danceinstruction" tag?
I am totally positive about people trying to play with tags like this. I would love to, myself, if I had access to all this data. But ultimatly, I remain wary about what we (1) will actually accomplish, and (2) could actually accomplish. And how much data will we actually need, before something becomes truly useful?
Posted by Jeremy on February 21, 2007 at 05:08 PM EST #