San José State University
School of Library and Information Science
LIBR 287: Seminar in Information Science
Topic: Folksonomies, categorization, taxonomies, and tagging in a Web 2.0 world.

Instructor

Robert Bruce

Prerequisites

LIBR 202

Course Description

Students explore the theoretical implications (e.g. controlled versus "uncontrolled" vocabulary, facet analysis, etc.) and practical applications (e.g. CiteULike, Library Thing) of the social-based Web 2.0 technology, "tagging" (a folksonomy) to libraries.

Learning Outcomes

At the completion of the course, you should be able to:

• Explain the differences between a controlled and "uncontrolled" vocabulary (folksonomy).
• Compare and contrast the advantages and disadvantages of controlled vocabuliaries and folksonomies.
• Compare and contrast the advantages and disadvantages of hierarchical, distributed, and faceted classification schemes.
• Explain how folksonomies affect Information Retrieval (e.g. through collaborative filtering).
• Explain how folksonomies could be applied in libraries.
• Understand how to organize information hierarchically or through facets.

Required Texts/Readings

Feinberg, M. (2006). An examination of authority in social classification systems. In J. Furner & J. T. Tennis (Eds.), Advances in classification research: Vol. 17. Proceedings of the 17th ASIS&T SIG/CR Classification Research Workshop (pp. 1-11). Medford, NJ: Information Today.

Foskett, D. J. (2003). Facet Analysis. In Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science (2nd ed., pp. 1063-1067). New York: Taylor & Francis Group.

Gross, T., & Taylor, A. G. (2005). What have we got to lose? The effect of controlled vocabulary on keyword searching results. College & Research Libraries, 66, 212-230.

Hartley, J., & Kostoff, R. N. (2003). How useful are "key words" in scientific journals? Journal of Information Science, 29(5), 433-438.

Lin, X., Beaudoin, J. E, Bui, Y., & Desai, K. (2006). Exploring characteristics of social classification. In J. Furner & J. T. Tennis (Eds.), Advances in classification research: Vol. 17. Proceedings of the 17th ASIS&T SIG/CR Classification Research Workshop (pp. 1-19). Medford, NJ: Information Today.

Morville, P. (2005). Ambient Findability. Sebastopol, CA: O'Reilly.

Rivadeneira, A. W., Gruen, D. M., Muller, M. J., & Millen, D. R. (2007). Getting our head in the clouds: Toward evaluation studies of tagclouds. Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems, 995-998.

Svenonius, E. (2003). Design of Controlled Vocabularies. In Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science (2nd ed., pp. 822-838). New York: Taylor & Francis Group.

Tennis, J. T. (2006). Social tagging and the next steps for indexing. In J. Furner & J. T. Tennis (Eds.), Advances in classification research: Vol. 17. Proceedings of the 17th ASIS&T SIG/CR Classification Research Workshop (pp. 1-19). Medford, NJ: Information Today.

Grading

Grading will be based on a total accumulation of 100 possible points, distributed as follows:

Assignment	Points
Class Participation	5
Assignment 1 - Book tags	5
Assignment 2 - Journal article tags	10
Assignment 3 - Evaluating enumerative classification schemes	15
Assignment 4 - Creating a faceted classification scheme	15
Assignment 5 - Tag analysis: books	10
Assignment 6 - Tag analysis: journals	15
Assignment 7 - Final Essay	25
TOTAL POINTS	100

Grading Scale

Percent range	Grade
97% to 100% inclusive	A
94% to 96% inclusive	A-
91% to 93% inclusive	B+
88% to 90% inclusive	B
85% to 87% inclusive	B-
82% to 84% inclusive	C+
79% to 81% inclusive	C
76% to 78% inclusive	C-
73% to 75% inclusive	D+
70% to 72% inclusive	D
67% to 69% inclusive	D-
Below 67%	F

Course Schedule

Week	Topics, Readings, Assignments, Deadlines
1	Introduction and Getting Started
2	Information and Taxonomies
3	Classification Schemes: Enumerated (part 1) Read: Design of Controlled Vocabularies by Svenonius (2003). DUE: Assignment 1 - Book tags 5
4	Classification Schemes: Enumerated (part 2) DUE: Post at least one comment on the article by Svenonius (2003).
5	Classification Schemes: Faceted (part 1) Read: Facet Analysis by Foskett (2003). DUE: Assignment 2 - Journal article tags
6	Classification Schemes: Faceted (part 2) DUE: Post at least one comment on article by Foskett (2003).
7	Classification Schemes: Distributed Read: Chapter 6 of Ambient Findability by Morville (2005).
8	Web 2.0 site evaluations (part 1) DUE: Post at least one comment on chapter 6 of Morville (2005). DUE: Assignment 3 - Evaluating enumerative classification schemes
9	Web 2.0 site evaluations (part 2)
10	Resources that use controlled vocabularies (part 1) DUE: Assignment 4 - Creating a faceted classification scheme
11	Resources that use controlled vocabularies (part 2)
12	Issues in classification: Controlled vocabularies Read: What have we got to lose? The effect of controlled vocabulary on keyword searching results by Gross & Taylor (2005). DUE: Assignment 5 - Tag analysis - books
13	Issues in classification: Folksonomies Read: How useful are "key words" in Scientific journals? By Hartley & Kostoff (2003). DUE: Post at least one comment on the article by Gross & Taylor (2005).
14	Folksonomies and controlled vocabularies: hybridized? Read: Social tagging and the next steps for indexing by Tennis (2006). Read: An examination of authority in social classification systems by Feinberg (2006). Read: Exploring characteristics of social classification by Lin, et. al. (2006). DUE: Post at least one comment on the article by Hartley & Kostoff (2003).
15	Tag visualization and Collaborative filtering Read: Getting our head in the clouds: Toward evaluation studies of tagclouds by Rivadeneira, et. al. (2007). DUE: Post at least one comment on one of the following articles: Tennis (2006), Feinberg (2006), or Lin, et. al. (2006).
16	Reflection DUE: Post at least one comment on the article by Rivadeneira, et. al. (2007). DUE: Assignment 6 - Tag analysis - journals DUE: Assignment 7 - Final Essay