folksonomies

A folksonomy is user created metadata and we all know that metadata is data about data. While taxonomy is something that would help you find information in a library, a set of specific classifications set up by a certain person or institution, a folksonomy is created by the people. Things are listed or categorized the way the specific person wants them to be and that is the biggest difference between a folksonomy and taxonomy. One of the main advantages of a folksonomy is that the users themselves get to label and structure their data whatever way they want. There is not a rigid system set in place that tells them how they are supposed to label it. If a person has a flickr account with a picture of a rabbit and they want to label that picture with the word cute, then they can do that. Under a more rigid system the rabbit would always be labeled a rabbit and nothing else. The words that people use to describe things are called tags. People can use many different tags to describe or label many different things. Chris points out the negative side to tags. He states that different people may use different tags to describe the same thing and that could be confusing. Jennifer also talks about this in her response and she gives a really great quote about the “ambiguity of tags.”

I went and looked at Gilbert’s del.icio.us tag and saw many different things. He has many different tags and each on represents something different. Under comedy, he has a clip from The Daily Show, but he also has a tag labeled The Daily Show which has different stuff. He could have easily put those two clips together under either comedy or The Daily Show. It’s really just a matter of what the specific person wants to do and that’s the beauty of a folksonomy.

The ability to organize our own data is the best part of a folksonomy. The people are given the power over their own data and are able to do what they want with it. Through a folksonomy, information is more easily accessible to the masses and people are able to share information more easily. Wikapedia was created on this concept of people defining things and being able to contribute to the defining of things.

I think Alexis makes a good point about companies and organizations getting on board with folksonomies and giving their employee’s the opportunity to, “navigate through company information.” The web is talking over every aspect of people’s lives and the sooner everyone, including companies, normal people, schools, etc, take advantage of all of the possibilities it offers, including folksonomies, the better off they would be.