Jessica R. Buchanan
Dr. Kazmer
LIS5703 – Information Organization
December 10, 2011
Subjects
Introduction
When
the goal of creating a comprehensive database is that of user findability, it
is vital to take into account user expectations of information retrieval. With
the increased use of online search engines, the average user anticipates
certain results based upon their own understandings (Rolla). These expectations
are derived from an ever growing use of folksonomies created through social
tagging. In this paper, I will examine the folksonomy created by my classmates
and myself, the problems that our folksonomy faced in contrast to controlled
vocabulary in subject headings and how other subject access systems compare to
our folksonomy in use of controlled vocabulary versus social tagging.
RefWorks
Folksonomy
Throughout the
semester my classmates and I have contributed bibliographic information for
resources we believed to be useful in writing our two class papers. With these
contributions, we were asked to submit descriptors, or tags, to identify what
our resources covered. With these descriptors, we created our own folksonomy. When
this folksonomy is examined closely one can see the common issues found in
social tagging.
Subjectivity
in Social Tagging
Without
the guidelines of a controlled vocabulary, folksonomies can “suffer from a
certain degree of messiness and inconsistency” (Thomas, Caudle, and Schmitz).
When one conducts a search it is based upon their understanding, and thus it
stands to reason, that our descriptors would be reflective of how we interpret
the articles that we contributed (Taylor and Joudrey 333) (Bates and Rowley). Folksonomies
are influenced greatly by the person creating the tag and can lead to
deviations and ambiguities (Thomas, Caudle, and Schmitz). In “Folksonomies:
Path to a Better Way” Costentino found that the majority of tags in
folksonomies were highly subjective and based on the worldview of the tagger
themselves. In our class folksonomy there is a level of subjectivity based on
how we came to our descriptors. While I may read an article and feel that the
most important aspects are its coverage of MARC, Dublin Core, and Cataloging, a
classmate may read the same article and believe that its coverage of Metadata,
Cataloging Systems, and Controlled Vocabulary are the best descriptors to
highlight this particular article. Without the presence of controlled
vocabulary we are left to our own understandings as opposed to a set of
standards that would lead to a higher level of consistency (Lu, Park and Hu).
Specific
vs. General Terms
Taylor and
Joudrey mention that specific versus general terms is a challenge that even
controlled vocabulary faces (336). If we examine the class folksonomy we can
also see how this is a challenge faced through social tagging as well. Peter J.
Rolla discusses, at great length, how social tags are generally very specific
or very broad in comparison to most subject headings in controlled vocabulary. He
gives a few examples of a how Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH)
differ from how he might tag the books himself. Here is one such example: “The
LC catalogs Bean’s Aegean Turkey, a
guide to the archeological sites of Turkey’s western coast, under the single
subject, “Ionia.” For me, however, the book is about Turkey and archaeology”
(Rolla). We can see through this example that there is a gap between specific
and general terms used to help find a book. In our class folksonomy we can also
see the general versus specificity used when creating our descriptors. One of
the best examples of this is the use of the descriptor “metadata.” Our class
used the single, broad, descriptor of “metadata” 27 times in our contribute
assignments. In addition to these 27 uses of the single word descriptor, there
were also several more specific descriptors used in conjunction with the word
metadata. Here is a list of the more specific metadata descriptors: metadata creation,
metadata creation templates and editors, metadata format conversion, metadata
generation, metadata harvesting, metadata implementation strategies, metadata
objects description schema, metadata optimization techniques, metadata quality
control, metadata schemas, metadata sharing, metadata standards, metadata
structure, and metadata/evaluation. Through this we can see there were some contributors
who did not feel metadata was a specific enough descriptor and thus they added
to that a more precise account of what they believed their article was about.
Number
of Descriptors Assigned
For the purpose of our class contribute assignments we
were given a limit to how many descriptors were to be used. Three descriptors
were to be very specific and then the other three were left to our discretion
for a total of six descriptors. Taylor and Joudrey touch on the topic of
limited descriptors and share that this limitation can be useful in helping cut
down the indexing time, but does not always benefit the user due to the fact
that certain descriptors might be left out for time’s sake and may hinder the
user’s ability to find what they are looking for (344). You could of course,
have a similar effect if there are too many descriptors. In many social tagging
environments people tend to over-tag. This leads to an overwhelming number of
descriptors that can again, limit the user’s ability to find an item they are
looking for by providing too many options.
Subject
Access Systems
With the
increase in social tagging through sites like delicious, flickr, twitter, and
many others we are left with a plethora of ways that users have become familiar
with information organization. As previously stated, there are many flaws in
this type of information organization, but there are also a great many things
that we can learn. If we look at the class folksonomy in comparison to other
subject access systems, we can see the benefit of both a controlled vocabulary and
the usefulness of social tagging.
Rise
of the Folksonomy
In a time of social networking we are constantly learning
and exchanging new ideas. This has led to an increase in social tagging.
Wichowski touches on the idea that folksonomies grew out of a need for
findability “amidst a changing environment,” and that they were “developed ‘in
field’ in response to [that] environmental need.” Understanding that this type
of information organization caters to a generation of users who are heavily
inundated in social networking provides us with a context for the creation of
folksonomies. This type of social tagging leads to a quicker, more effective
means of exchanging information in a social environment leading to “an
improvement of the folksonomy usage” (Nocera and Ursino).
Social
Tagging vs. Subject Headings
When we compare the class folksonomy to other subject
access systems we can begin to see how controlled vocabulary in subject
headings and social tagging can provide us with different types of results. If
we look at The Internet Movie Database (IMDB) we see a high level of authority
control and how this type of control helps with the end goal of user
findability. It recognizes misspellings and offers recommendations if certain
terms are not found. When you look at a site like Flickr, you can still find
concrete terms, like a person, place or thing, but due to social tagging you
can also find ideas, symbolisms and abstract thoughts. The problem with the
lack of authority control in sites like this limits the ability to point users
in the right direction if they do make an error in spelling or if what they are
looking for does not exist in the system. Our class folksonomy has both authority
control (Assignment, Contribute #, and Contributor’s name) and social tagging
(our three self-determined descriptors). This helps to provide a view of how
the two can work together and weakness that they each possess.
Gross and Taylor discuss how “the best subject searching
was done by using both natural language searching and controlled vocabulary
searching in parallel.” Through their research they discovered that removing
subject headings completely would actually eliminate about one-third of the
results that users currently receive when doing both subject and keyword
searches (Gross and Taylor). Social tagging still has the problem of inconsistency
and “semantic ambiguity” which causes information professionals to stay
slightly skeptic of the “value of social tagging” (Lu, Park and Hu). Yet it
still stands to reason that this increase in user generated information organization
can help provide information professionals with a way to “engage users with
information management” (Lu, Park and Hu). Bates and Rowley also argue that the
“folksonomy might be able to achieve a user-oriented retrieval aboutness.”
Rolla states that the combination of controlled
vocabulary with user tags will increase user findability. He is very adamant
about the fact that user tags cannot replace the valuable use of controlled
vocabularies like LCSH, but that they can “point libraries in the right
direction” (Rolla). His research also showed that many user tags overlap with
LCSH (Rolla). This information helps to provide us with an understanding of how
user tags can help increase findability within controlled vocabulary settings
such as LCSH.
Conclusion
From the examination of the class folksonomy we created
this semester we can see how controlled vocabularies in subject headings and
user generated tagging can have both positive and negative effects on the
findability of information objects. Lu, Park and Hu mention that “social
annotation” and controlled vocabulary like LCSH would benefit from
co-existence. The marriage of these two concepts would provide a more user
friendly search environment that would result in better findability. Steps are
already being taken to provide this type of culmination through products such
as LibraryThing (Thomas, Caudle, and Schmitz). If the end product of findability
is kept as a top priority among information professionals we are likely to see
a more user friendly environment in which we collectively learn, and help
others learn as well.
Works
Cited
Antonino Nocera, Domenico Ursino, “An
approach to providing a user of a “social folksonomy” with recommendations of
similar users and potentially interesting resources.” Knowledge-Based Systems, 24.8 (2011): 1277-1296. Electronic.
Bates,
Jo, and Jennifer Rowley. "Social
reproduction
and exclusion in subject indexing: A comparison of public library OPACs and
LibraryThing folksonomy." Journal of Documentation 67.3 (2011):
431-48. Electronic.
Cosentino,
Sharon L. "Folksonomies: Path to a Better Way?" Public Libraries
47.2 (2008): 42-7. Electronic.
Gross,
Tina, and Arlene G. Taylor.
"What Have We Got to Lose? The Effect of Controlled Vocabulary on Keyword
Searching Results." College & Research Libraries 66.3 (2005):
212-30. Electronic.
Lu,
Caimei, Jung-ran Park,
and Xiaohua Hu.
"User tags versus expert-assigned subject terms: A comparison of
LibraryThing tags and Library of Congress Subject Headings." Journal of
Information Science 36.6 (2010): 763-79. Electronic.
Rolla,
Peter J. "User Tags versus Subject Headings: Can User-Supplied Data
Improve Subject Access to Library Collections?" Library Resources &
Technical Services 53.3 (2009): 174-84. Electronic.
Taylor,
Arlene G. and Daniel N. Joudrey. The
Organization of Information. 3rd ed. Connecticut: Libraries
Unlimited, 2009. Print.
Thomas,
Marliese, Dana M. Caudle, and Cecilia Schmitz. "Trashy Tags: Problematic
Tags in LibraryThing." New Library World 111.5-6 (2010): 223-35. Computer
and Information Systems Abstracts. Electronic.
Wichowski,
Alexis. "Survival
of
the
fittest
tag: Folksonomies, findability, and the
evolution of
information organization." First Monday (Online) 4 May 2009. Electronic.
