1. Social Tagging IN Library
OPACS
Philip Whitford

2. Introduction & Outline
• Social Tagging
• Basic Terms
• Current Conversation
• Functionality
• How’s It Being Used
• Search Language?

3. Social Tagging
Basic Terms

4. Web 2.0
Websites that rely heavily on
users contributing content.

5. Library 2.0
Library websites that rely heavily
on users contributing content.

6. Social Tags
User generated words and
phrases to describe online
content.

7. Folksonomies
The clustering of social tags
from the point of view of a
collection or community.

8. Social Annotations
Any form of content that is
added to an online document
(can include social tags).

9. The Current
Conversation

10. Current Conversation
Kwan, Yi, and Chan Lois Mai. 2009. "Linking folksonomy to
Library of Congress subject headings: an exploratory
study." Journal Of Documentation 65, no. 6:
872-900.
Compared social tags in Delicious to LCSH
“60.9 percent of the tags fall in the category of complete-
word match with at least one subject heading in the subject
authority file.”

11. Yi and Mai (cont.)

12. Current Conversation
Thomas, Marliese, Dana M. Caudle, and Cecilia Schmitz.
"Trashy tags: problematic tags in LibraryThing."
New Library World 111, no. 5/6 (July 2010):
223-235.
“In particular, lexical anomalies (e.g. grammatical
variations) and lack of synonym, homonym, and
homograph control could result in a high probability of
noise and recall in users’ search results at the expense of
retrieval precision, making it difficult to pull together
similar or related resources.” (emphasis mine)

13. Thomas et al (cont.)

14. Thomas et al (cont.)

15. How It is
Being Used
Social Tagging

16. How to Add a Tag to the OPAC

17. How to Add a Tag to the OPAC

18. Using Tags
Think Unlimited
Go beyond the individual item
Connect to the collection in a new way
Adding NL to the OPAC
Objective v. Subjective (The Best…)

19. Genre Tags
Age Level/Grade Level
Subgenre (Cozy Mystery)
Crossgenre (Paranormal Romance)
Fringegenre (Environmental Fiction)

20. Using Tags
Use single words unless necessary
Could this be problematic?

21. Another Game! Name
This Book
Using LCSHs identify the book

22. What Book Am I?
• New York (N.Y.) — Fiction

23. What Book Am I?
• New York (N.Y.) — Fiction
• Runaway Teenagers — Fiction

24. What Book Am I?
• New York (N.Y.) — Fiction
• Runaway Teenagers — Fiction
• Caulfield, Holden (Fictitious Character) — Fictio

25. What Book Am I?
• New York (N.Y.) — Fiction
• Runaway Teenagers — Fiction
• Caulfield, Holden (Fictitious Character) — Fictio
• Runaway Teenagers — New York (State) — N

26. What Movie Am I?
• Feature Films

27. What Movie Am I?
• Feature Films
• World War, 1939-1945 — Refugees — Drama

28. What Movie Am I?
• Feature Films
• World War, 1939-1945 — Refugees — Drama
• Morocco — History — 20th Century — Drama

29. What Movie Am I?
• Feature Films
• World War, 1939-1945 — Refugees — Drama
• Morocco — History — 20th Century — Drama
• World War, 1939-1945 — Underground Movements —

30. Another Game! Name
This Book
Using Tags identify the book

31. What Book Am I?
• epic • top 100
• fantasy • uear 9
• literature - europe • year 10
• middle earth • year 9
• premiers reading challenge 2009

32. What Book Am I?
• 1001-list
• 2011
• boston latin school
• class iv
• read 2 of required

33. How Social Tagging is
Being Used
Examples:
Seattle Public Library

34. Books That Were Evaluated
• A Death in the Family • White Fang
• My Antonia • Moby Dick
• The Last of the Mohicans • Tropic of Cancer
• The Red Badge of Courage • The Moviegoer
• An American Tragedy • Great Short Works of Edgar Allan Poe
• Invisible Man • The Catcher in the Rye
• Light in August • The Grapes of Wrath
• The Great Gatsby • Uncle Tom's Cabin
• So Big • The Magnificent Ambersons
• The Sun Also Rises • The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
• Their Eyes Were Watching God • Slaughterhouse-five
• On the Road • The Optimist's Daughter
• One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest • Miss Lonelyhearts
• To Kill A Mockingbird • The Age of Innocence
• Babbitt • Native Son

38. The Data:
LCSH Tags
147 Subject Headings 191 Tags
4.9 SH/Book 6.4 Tags/Book
Highest # - 11 SH Highest # - 59
93.3% Have SH 73.3 Have Tags
2 Books with 0 SH 8 Books with 0 SH

39. The Data: The Age of Innocents
LCSH
• Love Stories
Tags
• Domestic Fiction
• Separated People — Fiction • 1001-list
• Manners and Customs — Fiction
Triangles (Interpersonal Relations) — Fiction books made into movies
•
•
• Marriage — New York (State) • new york city
— New York — Fiction
• Upper Class — New York (State) — • pulitzer prize winner
New York — Fiction
• New York (N.Y.) • romantic
— Social Life and Customs — Fiction
• Man-woman Relationships — New York (State) • tuesday afternoon book group
— New York — Fiction
• United States — Social Life and Customs — turn-of-the-century
•
19th Century

40. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
• si-fi • empathy
• technology • sci-fi
• science fiction • stark
• distopia • science fiction
• dark • dark
• blade runner • grim
• androids • unpredictable
• reality • bleak
• social commentary • androids
• science fiction • future
• androids • love

41. What about World Wars?
• World War – 104 • WWII – 50
• WWI – 20 • WW II – 13
• WW I – 2 • WW2 – 8
• WW1 – 2 • War World 2 – 19
• World War I – 16 • World War II – 61
• World War 1 – 4 • World War 2 – 19
• First World War - 2 • Second World War – 2

42. Popular Fiction

43. New Fiction

44. Popular Non-Fiction

45. New Non-Fiction

46. More Data:

47. A Search
Language?
Social Tagging

48. SPL – 902,662 Records

49. SPL – 47,552 Records Missing SH
* NOT .SW=*

51. No Such Luck In Bibliocommons

52. The Data:

53. Who Can Benefit?
• Alternative Publishers
• Web Born Publications
• Sub Genres
• Readings Levels
• Current Events
• Multidisciplinary Books
• Reader Advisory

54. Who Is The Authority?

55. What’s The Harm?

56. What’s The Harm?

57. What’s The Harm?

58. What’s The Harm?

59. What’s The Harm?

60. What’s The Harm?

61. What’s The Harm?

62. What’s The Harm?