Theresa regli bw-3

Folksonomies | Power to the People

April 26, 2006

Theresa RegliDirector, Content Management

Copyright © 2006 Molecular, Inc. | www.molecular.com 2

Simple Truth | People see the world differently

SAND TRAP BUNKER


Simple Truth | Words evoke multiple meanings

BREAKFAST


Taxonomy• Law for categorizing information

Meta Data and/or Content Attributes• Information about content: "data about the data Synonym Ring:

A set of words/phrases that can be used interchangeably for searching. (Hypertension, high blood pressure)

Thesaurus• A tool that controls synonyms and identifies the relationships

among terms

Controlled Vocabulary• A list of preferred and variant terms, with relationships

(hierarchical and associative) defined

Accounting for differences for this in the CM world


Sample Taxonomy | Dewey Decimal


A) General WorksB) Philosophy, Psychology, ReligionC) History: Auxiliary SciencesD) History: General and Old WorldE) History: United StatesF) History: Western HemisphereG) Geography, Anthropology, RecreationH) Social ScienceJ) Political ScienceK) Law

L) EducationM) MusicN) Fine ArtsP) Literature & LanguagesQ) ScienceR) MedicineS) AgricultureT) TechnologyU) Military ScienceV) Naval ScienceZ) Bibliography & Library Science

While both taxonomies are used in libraries,note how the differences in classification are specifically accommodating:

• Audience• Subject matter

Sample Taxonomy | Library of Congress


• Faceted taxonomies allow users to narrow down and select based on very granular attributes


Why Tag? R3 | Right Content, Right User, Right Time™

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• Taxonomies are top-down, dictatorial, “expertly”-determined classification schemes with variable flexibility

• Though invaluable in the CMS realm, taxonomies are rarely exhaustive or encompassing of many individuals’ perspectives on content

• Folksonomies give “Power to the People” to tag and retrieve content to their liking, and share that approach/perspective with others

• But with such freedom come many drawbacks• Folksonomies are more anarchistic than democratic

Taxonomy Backlash


• Folksonomy: the anti-controlled vocabulary. Collaborative, user-driven vocabularies for tagging content, rarely with any sort of control

• Portmanteau of the words “folks” and “taxonomy”• Method of labeling and organizing data by collaborative

tagging• Arise in Web-based communities where technology

exists that allow users to create and use tags• Generally applied to the labeling and sharing of user-

generated or collaboratively-created existing content, such as blogs

• Relevance between meta data and content may be determined by users in a democratic fashion• four users define an object as being ‘green' • one user defines an object as being ‘aqua' • relevance can be defined as "more green than aqua”• derived by the user-defined meta tags

Folksonomy Basics


Folksonomy Example | Flickr


Folksonomy Example | Flickr


Hey, you, get off of my cloud…


• Social networking software: applications that connect friends, business partners, or other individuals together using a variety of tools• MySpace, LinkedIn • Folksonomies facilitate social networking

• One of many technologies that allow users to “take over” and be the master of their domains• Wikis, RSS, blogs, faceted browsing

• Collabularies: yet another portmanteau combining “collaborative” and “vocabulary” (sounds like another word for “language” to me!)

Folksonomy roots and related trends


Folksonomy Disadvantages

Meta noise: inaccurate or irrelevant meta data


• Meta noise is prevalent in systems not based on a controlled vocabulary, such as meta data defined by users in a folksonomy

• Examples:• Case insensitive (chinese vs. Chinese)• Incorrectly spelled tags (blu instead of blue) • Singular vs. plural (cat vs. cats)• Lack of hierarchy (cheese & Roquefort tag at the same

level)• Tags which are loosely unrelated (frog on a content

object featuring only a lilly pad)



• On systems open to large user groups, esoteric tags which are understood by a only minority of users tend to proliferate• burdens users• decreases system efficiency

• Core to folksonomies are the flaws that formal classification systems are designed to eliminate, such as redundancy, misspelling, etc.

• Taxonomists/ontologists (this one included) argue that an agreed-to set of tags enables more efficient indexing and searching of content



Simple Truths

• The universe has a natural tendency towards chaos• Human beings naturally seek to make order out of that

chaos• Chaos theory purports that there is order to be found in

every chaotic “pattern”


Making order of chaos


Making order of chaos


Making order of chaos?


• Often, users can discover & befriend folksonomy tag creators• Lower content categorization costs

• No hierarchically organized nomenclature to learn• Users simply create and apply tags on the fly

• Inherently open-ended (some consider this a disadvantage)• Can respond quickly to changes and whims of users• Like open source software, wikis and blogs, this creates an

environment of adaptability and innovation • Tags are generated by people who have spent more time interacting

with the content than taxonomists or ontologists have • Highly personalized

• Users can tag with whatever they want, when they want• Encouraging

• Users immediately see the results of their influence on the system• Minority views/opinions/perspectives don’t get squashed out

It’s not all bad | Folksonomy Advantages


• Folksonomy may be one of the keys to developing a truly Semantic Web, where every online object contains machine-readable meta data that describes its content

• Not only would search engine precision improve, but a more relevant web of related information could be enabled

• The challenge is the governing structure that would keep tags consistent, and the willingness of people to tag things

Key to the Semantic Web?


• Consider a moderated / edited folksonomy, supported by a taxonomy framework• Create clusters and hierarchies based on user tags• Eliminate / merge redundant tags• Flickr is a great example

• Give users tagging guidelines• User research and analysis should be the foundation of

any taxonomy design process• This will minimize the need for folksonomy

• Folksonomy functionality is great for blogs – allowing users to tag their entries on the fly based on any new topic they wish

The best of both worlds


R3 | Right Content, Right User, Right Time™

Pro

duct

sFo

rms

& A

pps

Pric

es &

Rat

es

Abo

ut U

sE

duca

tion

& P

lann

ing

Financial Advisor

Institutional Consultant

Financial Analyst

Retirement Plan Sponsor / TPA

Institutional & Retail Investor

Attract

Engage

Convert

Support

Renew

© 2006 Molecular


Discussion / Q&A

Thank you!Feel free to e-mail me:

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