Tag, Your It!

Wikipedia had a mouthful to say about tagging. Librarians have been tagging for years, with the help of Sears Subject headings and Library of Congress subject headings to name a couple. Now with the web, subjects have become a free for all in the name of tagging. It is pretty obvious that some people are good at it and some are not. The topic to be tagged and what is considered important is actually in the eye of the tagger. For example, usually when I write about what the library is doing, the first tag I put is the library's name because I want people to find us. Someone else who reads my articles may not put the library's name because the library may not be the main topic of the article. The tagging assignment could easily be placed earlier on in the web 2.0 training because a lot of the web 2.0 tools give the option for tagging so learning about tagging early on could help know what it is and possibly how to do it. Tagging can be beneficial to libraries serving thier patrons but the most important thing is that the tags still need to be reviewed and evaluated to make sure that it provides the information needed so that the patrons can find the information they are looking for.