Thing #18: "Tag" Something on a Web 2.0 Service

Description:

A "tag" is label that can be applied to a photo, bookmark or anything else so that it a) can be described and b) may be put aside for later. This "thing" asks you to try out a tag on a service of your choice.

Here are some popular services that offer tags:

• Blogger, Wordpress (although don't you think this is cheating a little)?
• LibraryThing, and Bibliophil
• del.icio.us
• Flickr, YouTube and related sites.

Hints:

• You may need an account with the service you are using to create tags.
• The collection of tags used on a service is called a "Folksonomy." Remember that: it will help you complete Thing Number 20, and has one other use you will discover later.
• Think of tags as like storing something in a folder, except the folder is "applied" to the object instead of the object being put in the folder. The main advantage is that tags work as if you had the same file in a number of different folders at the same time.
• Tagging is also helpful because it can be unique. For instance, maybe you need a certain photo for a course or program -- you can tag the photo with the program/course name!

Resources:

• The Flickr Tagging page.
  

Promoting your blog and a preview of Thing #16

A number of you expressed interest in sharing your blog either with me, or to promote it more widely now that you have it. That's great! Here are a few notes:

• There's going to be a 10-question quiz (via surveymonkey) to help me know if you completed the 23 things -- one of the questions will be: "what is the address for your blog?"
• If you would like to have your blog linked from this blog, just let me know, either by using the feedback form or by leaving a comment on this post. If you look down (waaaay down) you'll see that Sara Gillis & David Lewis already did ask me to do this (UPDATE: Cheryl Black and "Library Doodling" are added as well). I'm going to start by adding RSS feeds and then move to links if there are too many.
• 
  

Later on, I will ask you to "tag" a website (perhaps your blog) using del.icio.us (and write a quick post about delicious on your blog). That will be "thing #16" in fact.

If you want try del.icio.us (and I would consider this "advanced" unless you consider yourself a "techie") go ahead. My only caveat is to either

• do this from home or
  
• skip "Step #2" in the registration process (just go on to step #3) if you are applying for an account from a work PC. (delicious wants you to add an extension to Firefox or Internet Explorer when you apply and I do not want the extension on staff computers -- yet.)
  

When we get there (in early January), I will offer a way to make the del.icio.us "thing" easy to do for any non-techies out there.