Tags vs. Hierarchy

by Kevin Jones on March 16, 2009

They were easy enough to do, why not do more?

Tags vs. Hierarchy

Tags vs. Hierarchy

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Tagging Advantages:

  • Results are much more contextual*
  • Community tags
  • Fits into many ‘categories’
  • Tags are user generated
  • Not lost in a sub-sub-sub folder
  • Findability increases
  • Learning increases

*With hierarchies you are limited to one category in which to place information.  In reality, one piece of information may fit MANY different categories (sub-sub folders for example) and may fit in one for a particular context and not in the same for a different context.  Tags allow for more than one ‘category’ and this information is not pigeonholed into one.

Tagged as: tagging, vs.

  • George
    Tagging works well if all users adopt the same tagging dictionary. Tags can multiply and become just as disorganised and confusing as a hierarchical structure
  • There are a couple things that that make it less cluttered: 1) Tagging is very personal. If you are looking for a particular subject, there could be thousands of tags, but you are looking only for a specific few. Much like a dictionary where there are thousands of words, but the only ones that interest you at a particular moment are the ones you will look for, the rest are ignored. 2) It is true that variations can be annoying (pict vs. picture vs. pictures). But any good tagging system will allow you to use frequently used tags so that you are consistently choosing the ones used most often and recognizable by others.
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