Thing 11

Well, I read through the stuff on tagging and del.icio.us and have to say that, as an old fuddy-duddy librarian, I want a controlled vocabulary for tagging. I looked through the tags used in the minn23 account on del.icio.us, and there were numerous examples of the use of both singular and plural forms of individual tags as well as multiple synonyms for the same concept. While I understand the idea that the tags should represent the language we would use to describe something, if what we call something is not consistent over time, and we don't call something the same thing as someone else does, the collaborative nature of the process breaks down. That being said, I can see how valuable applying a consistent set of tags could be to someone who needs to create the online equivalent of a filing cabinet, especially given the ability to apply more than one tag to a particular document. But as one who uses the "create a couple of really messy looking piles on the top of your desk, and then paw through them until you find the paper for which you are looking" method of organization, the idea that I'm any more likely to follow through on any organized way of maintaining access to online resources is pretty laughable. As we move forward on the major building program over the next year, however, I might be much more motivated to try to make something like this work for me.