Folksonomies & Taxonomies

Taxonomies are part of our daily life—whether it be the arrangement of aisles in the supermarket; the library’s Dewey Decimal system; or the news content you read online—they’re all part of the science of categorisation. Categorisation of content is very important for Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), targeted advertising and user navigation. Automation and tools for automatic categorisation aren’t ideal, but can help. Categorising your content using both Taxonomies and Folksonomies is a good way to add info architecture as it takes into consideration both ‘meta’ or structured views of data, as well as micro or user-centric views of data. While taxonomies don’t change that much, Folksonomies change all the time and grow with your users—think of them as social or collaborative categorisations. While often chaotic in appearance, Folksonomies offer insights into the prevailing structure of data, which can be mined and used to your advantage.