In the past several weeks, we have discussed many techniques for organizing information, including metadata standards, controlled vocabularies, faceted classification, contextual capture of metadata and classification. In this assignment, you will apply these techniques to analyzing and organizing your own information collection in the context of a social / distributed categorization application, either del.icio.us or Flickr.
The assignment instructions are slightly different for people who currently use del.icio.us or Flickr and people who do not currently use either site. Please decide which category you are in and follow the corresponding instructions to complete the assignment. Please upload your part 1 work before class on 29 October and bring three printed copies to class. Do the same for part 2 for 3 November
- You can consider yourself a current user of del.icio.us or flickr if you have 20 or more items categorized in the application as of 20 October 2008.
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Part 1A. ANALYZE YOUR CURRENT TAG USE
Have a look at your tag list and counts. (In Flickr, you can find this information using the You/YourPhotos/Tags menu choice). In del.icio.us, this information is visible on your home page.
Answer the following questions. Each of the subparts should be a separate labeled paragraph in your report to make it easy for us to evaluate your work.
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1A-1. Tell us which of the two systems you are using for the assignment and its URL so that we can take a look at your item collection.
- 1A-2. How long have you used the system (the date of your first Flickr photo or del.icio.us bookmark) and how many items are now in your collection?
- 1A-3. What percentage of your items are tagged? (In del.icio.us, items without tags will be tagged "system:unfiled" by default.) What factors determine which items you tag and which you don't?
- 1A-4. How many different tags do you use? Comment on the frequency distribution.
- 1A-5. Are tags more likely to relate to the specific resource or to its type or category?
- 1A-6. Are there any problems with your tagset, such as inconsistent naming conventions, redundant tags, semantically ambiguous tags, or tags that just don't make sense to you anymore?
- 1A-7. Do you use a controlled vocabulary, either an external one like geotagging or one of your own invention?
- 1A-8. Do you use any of the other organizational features of the application? (For example, photo sets in Flickr, saving links for others or tag bundles in del.icio.us; chronological sorting in both).
Part 1B. DEFINE EXPLICIT TAGGING OBJECTIVES AND PRINCIPLES
Now that you've analyzed your current use, you can evaluate your tagging practices in light of what you've studied in this course.
- Identify from one to three objectives for a "principled" tagging approach. You might already be trying to do some or all of them, but the point here is to be explicit about it. These objectives might include
- Finding items more easily
- Helping others find your items
- Sharing your opinions on items in the system
- Creating a customized feed of tagged items for use outside the site
- ...something else
- For each objective, specify one or more principles or guidelines that you could follow in future tagging that would help you meet those objectives and explain why you think they will work. By "explain" I mean that you should relate something you've learned about concepts and techniques for information organization in this course to the desired outcome.
- As in Part 1A, separate each of the parts of Part 1B into a labeled paragraph in your report to make it easy for us to evaluate your work (i.e., Part 1B-1, 1B-2, 1B-3 for each of the objectives, the associated principles or guidelines, and the explanation).
- Turn in Part 1A and Part 1B of this assignment by 29 October. Upload a short report (Name it 202A6Part1_YourName) in HTML, creating it from XML using the report document type and XML transform that you used in previous assignments. This report should have two sections, one for each part of the assignment.
Part 2. PRINCIPLED TAGGING
In previous years Parts 1 and 2 were turned in together, but too many people were waiting until the last minute to do this assignment, which meant that Part 2 didn't provide any enjoyment or enlightenment. So we want you to spend at least a week trying to follow the explicit tagging principles you defined in the previous activity.
- 2-1. Tag at least 10 new items or retag ones already in your collection
- 2-2. Reflect (one paragraph, approximately 100 words) on the costs and benefits of a more systematic approach to tagging.
- Turn in Part 2 of this assignment by 3 November. Upload a short report (Name it 202A6Part2_YourName) in HTML, creating it from XML using the report document type and XML transform that you used in previous assignments.
IF YOU AREN'T CURRENTLY USING FLICKR OR DEL.ICIO.US
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You will use del.icio.us (http://del.icio.us) for the assignment.
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Part 1A. ANALYZE CURRENT TAG USE
Browse around del.icio.us and find some user who seems to share some of your interests. Ideally, this should be one of your classmates. Have a look at this user's tag list and counts.
Answer the following questions. Each of the subparts should be a separate labeled paragraph in your report to make it easy for us to evaluate your work.
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1A-1. Tell us the del.icio.us URL so that we can take a look at the item collection you are evaluating.
- 1A-2. How long has this user been tagging items in del.icio.us (the date of their first del.icio.us bookmark) and how many items are now in their collection?
- 1A-3. What percentage of the user's items are tagged? (In del.icio.us, items without tags will be tagged "system:unfiled" by default.) If the percentage of untagged items is greater than 10% of the total, try to distinguish the categories of "tagged items" and "untagged items."
- 1A-4. How many different tags does the user employ? Comment on the frequency distribution
- 1A-5. Are tags more likely to relate to the specific resource or to its type or category?
- 1A-6. Are there any problems with the tagset, such as inconsistent naming conventions, redundant tags, semantically ambiguous tags, or tags that just don't make sense to you?
- 1A-7. Does your user employ a controlled vocabulary, either an externally specified one like geotagging or one of his or her own invention?
- 1A-8. Does your user employ any of the other organizational features that del.icio.us provides (saving links for others, tag bundles, chronological sorting...).
Part 1B. DEFINE EXPLICIT TAGGING OBJECTIVES AND PRINCIPLES
Now that you've analyzed someone's current use, you can reflect on it and develop tagging practices in light of what you've studied in this course.
- Identify from one to three objectives for a "principled" tagging approach in del.icio.us. You might already be trying to do some or all of them, but the point here is to be explicit about it. These objectives might include
- Finding items more easily
- Helping others find your items
- Sharing your opinions on items in the system
- Creating a customized feed of tagged items for use outside the site
- ...something else
- For each objective, specify one or more principles or guidelines that you could follow in future tagging that would help you meet those objectives and explain why you think they will work. By "explain" I mean that you should relate something you've learned about concepts and techniques for information organization in this course to the desired outcome.
- As in Part 1A, separate each of the parts of Part 1B into a labeled paragraph in your report to make it easy for us to evaluate your work (i.e., Part 1B-1, 1B-2, 1B-3 for each of the objectives, the associated principles or guidelines, and the explanation).
- Turn in Part 1A and Part 1B of this assignment by 29 October. Upload a short report (Name it 202A6Part1_YourName) in HTML, creating it from XML using the report document type and XML transform that you used in previous assignments. This report should have two sections, one for each part of the assignment..
Part 2. PRINCIPLED TAGGING.
In previous years Parts 1 and 2 were turned in together, but too many people were waiting until the last minute to do this assignment, which meant that Part 2 didn't provide any enjoyment or enlightenment. So we want you to spend at least a week trying to follow the explicit tagging principles you defined in the previous activity.
- 2-1. Create a del.icio.us account. You can pick any username you like, but make sure you tell us what it is.
- 2-2. Tag at least 10 new items for your collection
- 2-3. Reflect (one paragraph, approximately 100 words) on the costs and benefits of a more systematic approach to tagging.
- Turn in Part 2 of this assignment by 3 November. Upload a short report (Name it 202A6Part2_YourName) in HTML, creating it from XML using the report document type and XML transform that you used in previous assignments.