Slashdot Mirror
Labels Not Tags, Says Google
Ashraf Al Shafaki writes "The word 'tags' is the one in common use on the Web today and is one of the distinctive features of Web 2.0. Ever since Gmail came out, Google has decided to use the term 'label' instead of the term 'tag' despite they are basically the exact same thing and have the exact same function. Why is Google using inconsistent terminology in its products for such an important term? Is there a real difference between a tag and a label?"
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=define%3A+tag
it certainly isnt what we see on blogs and web2.0 sites (except in the source code)
</endtag>
If the service is in the Beta phase it's Label. If it's in Alpha, it would be tag.
And if it's in production... well... how would we know?
I wouldn't say Google are inconsistent, how come they should call it tags if they think it should be labels? I have never heard of any W3C recommendation of the word 'tag' either, so anyone implenting this feature should be able to decide for themselves.
I think they do so intending it to be a replacement of an obsolete term "folder" or "directory". I myself was also fed up with directories on my PC. I hope in the future there will be no such thing as directories in the filesystem at all, and there will be labels instead.
LABELLING beta!
Get it Right, Dammit!
It makes more sense to call them "labels" because the word "tag" generally refers to html/xml tags. Since you can use these tags (although you don't have to) to create the label type of tags, it's especially confusing.
In any case, it's closer to plain English to call them labels. That's what you're doing. If I'm in GMail and I want to indicate that an email is work related it is closer to plain English to say that I labelled it work than to say that I tagged it work.
Is this what a slow news day really looks like?
-stormin
The Southern Baptist Convention has creationism. On Slashdot, we have porn.
I'm not sure if they use labels outside of gmail, but even so it is their interface and they should be able to decide what names they give to the features. I do think that in gmail labels are different than tags in the sense that only you apply them and that they are done by rules you create. Regular tags are usually added by people in the online community.
Web 2.0 has no distinctive features.
You say Tomato (tah-mah-tow), I say Tomato (toe-may-toe).
Tag sounds like it is a temporary attachment, to be removed on arrival at its destination. Label sound as if it is a permanent attachment. At least, that is how it sounds to me who doesn't work with html etc.
Tags are meant to be a general description- something which can be more or less universally agreed upon. Labels on the other hand are personal and thus can either be descriptive or refer to an action which should be taken in regards to the thing being labeled.
Eudora and Thunderbird use the term labels. MS Entourage and MS Outlook use the term categories. By the way, is there some standards document like RFC saying any web app, especially webmail, has to use the term tags?
Are they preparing for some sort of application which will include a future copyrighting/patenting claim on a word containing "label" because they can't do it with the word "tag"?
;-) )
A bit like the "iPhone" fuss?
(sorry, not a lawyer so probably mixing up patenting and copyrighting, you know, something that people would think of as just a fun word in most places but will lead to somebody sueing somebody else for multiple trillions of dollars in the the USA
Label makes it sound as if you're just applying a name to it for sorting. Tagging sounds as if you're trying to track it for nefarious evil purposes. If you wanted to sound less evil what would you use? It's all in marketing your product folks.
'Tagging' is when you put a mark on someone else's property... Hence maybe tagging is what other people do to your content (as here on slashdot) whereas labelling is what you do to your gmail messages... uh, maybe.
Maybe google just think tagging sounds like graffiti-talk...
Quite frankly, who cares?
That's it I'm off. You've driven me out of the house into the pissing rain where I'm going to get soaking wet... I hope you're happy with yourselves. I'll have to mingle with... "people"... I may catch something, if I do, I'll blame you.
Deleted
"Tagging" is often used to refer to graffiti, as well as the more positive meanings. Label almost always refers to the concept of "Something carrying identifying information". So, I think that "label" is clearer. Also, I wish everywhere would stick to comma separation, as this more closely fits with how lists are usually written, but that's another story (that was posted the other day).
I'm scared of numbers that can't be written as a fraction. It's an irrational fear.
This kind of discussion obscures the real point: that tags (or labels) are only as good as the userbase that creates them. For example, the OS X Vs. Vista story a little while ago - the tags were "yes", "no", "FUD" etc., which are worthless when you come to sort stories out (seriously, what kind of person uses "yes" as a search term?).
Using the word tag could be confusing to other web developers (html tags)
Perhaps Google simply wants to avoid the graffiti conotations associated with "tagging".
Why is Google using inconsistent terminology in its products for such an important term?
Important term?
Puh-lease.
You have a bunch of websites, many of which call themselves the buzzword-2.0 of the week, that have implemented a feature that has zero standardization or between-site meaning. Most of these sites actually allow users to post comments, making one-word comments completely pointless. Though someone will probably point me to a counterexample, I have yet to see a site that lets you meaningfully search or filter by tags.
On that point, note the key word, "meaningfully". Check out Amazon's tags for the best I've seen yet, and it still sucks so hard that you have a dozen words all describing (almost) the same thing - "Almost", except that you'd have to check every single one of them to find the 1% that they don't overlap. Example: "green", "environment", "environmental", "conservation", "sustainability", and a handful of similar words all mean the same thing, yet point to slightly different lists; And on those lists, do you find environmentally-friendly products? No. You find nothing but books of pseudoscience written by and for zealots.
I'll worry about what to call these things if (not "when") they actually take on some usefulness. Until then, you can call them "snergs" for all I care.
The 'label' is where the size and washing instructions are.
The 'tag' is where the price is.
I have made extensive use of the 'label' feature in gmail like I am sure many others here have too and I have found it very handy. Another aspect of my computing life that I found DESPERATELY needed labels was my music collection.
I have always organized my music in Genre - Artist - Album - song format, but I have found that too many songs would be multi-genre.
(ie. most modern Top40 songs today are also Rap/Dance/Hip-Hop)
So as a result my collection became mass-sorted into one of four major directories:
Rock/Alternative
Pop/Top 40/Rap/Hip Hop/Dance/Techno
Blues/R & B
Other
The ability to 'quickly find' a desired song became impossible.
Along came iTunes and it was awesome, but lacking.
Along came Amarok and it was better, but lacking.
Now Amarok has added a new feature called Labels, and I am in love (but it is still lacking).
Now I can ignore the Genre headache, and just use labels to identify what Genres of music that apply to the song.
This works only as long as I use Amarok for my music player. I am still SOL if i want to just browse the filesystem and grab a couple of songs on the spur of the moment.
What we need is a file system label structure that can/will apply to all files that we use.
Where to store Aunt Betty's cookie recipe? ~/docs/recipes ~/docs/aunt betty/ ~/docs/cookies
A bad solution is to create sym-links everywhere. A better solution would be to have labels appear as virtual directories.
"The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men." ~Plato (427-347 BC)
Come on... terminology comes and goes... AOL had keywords, web 2.0 has tags.
"The need to build the internet comes from something inside us, something programmed... something we can't resist."
It's only confusing to "developers" that don't understand tags in markup are only used to delimit an element and it's attributes.
lets be clear the reason why tag is more prevalent, it sounds cooler. While it might not be as logical a choice as Label it sounds more interesting and up-to-date. I doubt many people will associate tags with xml/html - I never did and I've been writing websites for a long time.
It does actually annoy me when places use terms other than tags for tagging stuff; I'm just used to that term and the process that goes with it. However this is non-story as a story can get.
If it REALLY bothers you, write a greasemonkey script that goes through google pages and replaces the word Label with the word Tag.
Promote Charity on Myspace, Show Your Colours!
"The word 'tags' is the one in common use on the Web today and is one of the distinctive features of Web 2.0.
Stopped reading right there. Would all you moron idiot 2.0 blogging script kiddy tards just die in a fire? Thanks. And quit the whining.
Is Slashdot trying to find out how low it can go, lately?
Google Docs & Spreadsheets uses tags.
...can be an invaluable search term.
Tags? Labels? Um, weren't these things just called "keywords" back in the Web 1.0 days?
Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
Why is Google using inconsistent terminology in its products for such an important term?
Because it's not an important term.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
"The word 'labels' is the one in common use on Google today and is one of the distinctive features of Google. Ever since Web 2.0 came out, Web 2.0 has decided to use the term 'tag' instead of the term 'label' despite they are basically the exact same thing and have the exact same function. Why is Web 2.0 using inconsistent terminology in its products for such an important term? Is there a real difference between a tag and a label?"
More importantly: How many Google's can dance on the head of a pin?
Heck, I see no difference between tags and keywords (except in coolness factor).
However, having a standard is important for interopperability. I suggest that folk look at the Dublin Core metadata standards. Check out the Wikipedia article on Dublin Core.
wherever I go, there I am.
Kind of reminds you of Cisco's switch from their terminology for tag switching to the more common label switching, doesn't it? Check out the Cisco documentation. It's not a direct comparison, but it does "kind of" remind you.
When I hear the word 'tag' outside of the computing domain, all I think of is 'price tag'. When I own something and want to set it apart from other things, I don't say "I'll put a tag on this," I say "I'll put a label on this." Label sounds like a more appropriate word for marking any particular object. I think it makes slightly more sense to non-techie folks.
Tags are a relatively new phenomenon as people discovered they can tag using tools like del.icio.us. But are tags, labels and directories the same thing? I've heard people say so, but I think ultimately "directories," or hierarchical categories, are most useful.
For example, the same word can mean different things in a different context (river: bank, or institution: bank, or even colour: black, lastname: black), and a larger number of tags is simply unwieldy. Better to have a browser interface. The best of which is combined with a keyword search (which should be combined with a sense-sensitive thesaurus so concepts are not repeated - wordnet has a number of libraries that could be suitable).
I'm working on something like this for a health project, but I'm not going to have the time to complete it in full glory.
In a way, though, the only difference is identifying a "separator" - if there were a common convention for hierarchies, based on some existing concept, like directory paths, xpath expressions, etc, we'd have the best of both worlds. But having normal people use these conventions would need to be part of the conversion. THEN we could have the same system for organizing everything.
Please tell me why this is fucking front-page stuff.
Label == tag. Pull out your thesaurus, go to a blank page, and scribble it in there.
Tenemus pyrobolos atqui jacimus cognitiones.
Of course, back in the old days we used to call them 'keywords'.
SCO employee? Check out the bounty
Slashdot just fucking jumped it!
Seriously, this is without question the aboslutely most worthless "article" I have ever seen. And I was here during the Michael Simms and Timothy period!
This is something I would expect to find on Digg. Is Slashdot feeling the heat from Digg, or are you people just fucking retarded? Either way, this "issue" is so utterly pointless that people will be dumber for having read about it.
Labels for this post: fucking, retarded
Oh my God. The attention-seekers! Write a blog-post about an irrelevant topic, and then write a slashdot story on it. Woah! And what's up with the mods who accept such stories?
I thought the main difference is tags are public and labels are private. E.g. nobody looks at your Gmail inbox except you (unless you have a stalker spouse). Labels there are only for YOU.
Tags are (usually) adjectives, including the infamous 'itsatrap'.
Labels are more like a form of categorisation, you might have labels in your Gmail entitled 'forwards' or 'household bills', things you'd rarely see in a tag.
I'm not trying to troll, but has anyone else noticed that slashdot is slowly repositioning itself from pro-google to anti-google? There used to be dozens of stories about the initiatives google was making to help out the little guy etc, but this is the second story today that's been critical of google.
Commodore64_love: I don't comprehend people who're so frightened of death that they'll bankrupt themselves to stay alive
Tags usually hang off of shit (like shirts on sale,) whereas labels are usually stuck-on. :)
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Both Docs.google.com and reader.google.com uses the term "tag" not label. Maybe gmail hasn't been updated yet as reader and docs are the newest of them.
I didn't use the preview button, so get over it!!!!
Mike
When I learned English at school, some teacher told me that the difference between "tag" and "label" was that the latter was British English while the former was American English.
I always believed that, but now that I see a whole page of comments by mostly native speakers of English where no one has mentioned it, I begin to doubt.
Even the terminology within Google's RSS reader is inconsistent. In the first settings tab, labels/tags/categories/whatever are called "folders". However, the second tab which manages these whatevers is called "tags". I guess it is still in beta...
tags = flickr
labels = gmail
But to me it largely doesn't matter. The question is, WHY is Google wasting time on this branding stuff? Running dry on innovations? Hired the wrong marketing team?
Speculate. Now.
I've been using Gmail and getting used to their "labels" idea long before "tagging" started showing up. Quotes are on both those terms because that's really what this is -- a question of defining terms. We don't even have a standardization on the way tags should be used, why should google (or gmail) feel any pressure to change their nomenclature for some nebulous standard?
Backing off from the specifics of this for a second, tags on most websites are "extra" data. The way Slashdot uses tags (eg: yes, no, maybe, fud, notfud... etc.) is not going to be as useful as the way I use gmail labels for categorizing my own mail. Slashdot (and other) tags are meant as quick commentary. A "project" label in my gmail might not mean the same thing as a "project" label in somebody's else's... and since I don't particularly need (or want) my categorization systems to be universal, why should they be submitted to some abstract universal standard?
"What's in a name? A pedantic pundit, by any other name, would still stink like a fart in an abattoir."
...Okay, maybe I'm paraphrasing a little.
Find environmentally and socially responsible products on http://buy-right.net
A tag is a separate piece that hangs off the thing being tagged.
A label is affixed.
Look at real life. A label is something that you stick on a product and becomes part of it. A tag is usually attached with a string or something and thus not part of it but it describes it. I prefer tag, but in the end it's just semantics. Label me an idiot, but that's my 2 cents
DR. ARMSTRONG: "I wish you wouldn't tag along, Betty."
BETTY ARMSTRONG: "I'm tagging, Paul, I'm tagging!"
DR. ARMSTRONG: "Well, I can't stop a woman from tagging."
BETTY ARMSTRONG: "No one ever has."
No... the above just wouldn't work with "label". Sorry Google.
I read a quote used by Chris Date that said that computer science (or information technology, more generally) has in many cases been reduced to the "bantering of names" rather than an in-depth understanding of underlying concepts. In other words, people will just slightly modify something that came before and then rename it. Why do people do this? Because "to name a thing is to own it".
Keywords, labels, tags, categories, WHO CARES?
Like objects, instances, values...??
methods, functions, subroutines, operators, messages...???
object-relational, post-relational, relational...???
Ugh. Maybe it's my engineering degrees, but the first thing I do when reading something like this is to STRIP AWAY THE VERBAGE and try and understand the DEEPER PRINCIPLES. It doesn't matter what the things are called.
Keywords/tags/labels/categories are all the same thing. Ad-hoc data attributes. No, there isn't some "subtle difference" between them, so stop trying to find it. Stop trying to find semantic nuance, like "well, labels are more permanent". No, it's just all fields in a database somewhere, right? There's no schema or constraint.
It's funny, about 10 years ago I wrote a non-critical app for a friend. We weren't able to hammer out the database schema so I decided to add a generic "keywords" field, and after a while we'd study the keywords and convert them into proper attributes. For instance, if the keywords included "big" and "small", that was a clue that we needed a "size" attribute, and so on.
I considered it a bad design in general, and it only worked because we "knew what we were doing".
Little did I know, I was AHEAD OF MY TIME. *laugh*
So, here's what I recommend: pick one of the terms and use it all the time. Whenever somebody uses a different one, ask yourself, "is there any REAL difference? Are there any hard boundaries, or is this just the SAME THING with different name?"
Don't worry if people think you're "web 1.0" if you call them "keywords" or whatever you called them 5 years ago. THEY are the dummies, not you.
Would be "worthless".
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
I know that Google is the darling fo the techworld, and all, with their "don't get caught doing evil" mantra, but this sounds disturbingly like Microsoft's "embarace and extend" stragety to conquer the world. Make your stuff work mostly like everybody else's, but call everything by different names. Next step is adding in new features that aren't quite compatible with the experimental stuff everyone else is doing.
Labels attach to an object using adhesive.
Tags usually attach with a plastic thread, and can dangle indepently of the object.
Organization: alphabetical, sometimes numerical or messy
because when you click on it, you GOTO the label.
Who ever heard of goto tag?
Not to mention, you can create a folder of tags. Each tag is also a folder that contains hard links to files that have a particular tag. You can still keep the file elsewhere in the file system. Furthermore, you can move the document around without affecting the hard link inside the tagging folder.
However, I'll also point out a number of problems with this approach.
My point is to concur with parent that directory hierarchy is a very flexible system; we might just lack creative ways to make it work for us.
I once had a signature.
Tags seem to make the most sense when the ui and functionality is built with them as a 'meaningful' organizing principle. And especially in the case of a site like delicious where the search is so comparatively slow :(
The semantic debate (is this a debate?) seems a little silly, though I can imagine that the developer discussions at google during gmail dev were pretty interesting. Personally, I like 'tags', and 'tagging' better because it's easier to say, and less formal feeling than 'labels' which have a certain onerous bureaucratic, kind of officey ring to them. I also find labeling in gmail to be less than optimal, although I don't know if it has to do with the heaviness of the words 'label' vs. 'tag'. Perhaps the lack of cloud format? Perhaps the god-awful drop-down ui that's required for labeling. Not sure which, but gmail could stand to learn a bit from delicious on this count.
Ummmm, Google Reader uses the term Tags, not Labels. Apparently someone needs to do their homework.
Why does Microsoft use the term "verb" in reference to HTTP when the official term is "method" and everyone else in the world (that I've encountered anyway) uses the official term? I can only speculate in both cases as to why these companies make such terminology changes. I can, however, explain the effects of such an act.
When you have a large group of people that all learn web technology the Microsoft way, it becomes ingrained into their mind that the proper term is verb. So long as they remain in MS world all is well. However, as soon as they try to interact with someone in another part of the industry (e.g. UNIX-land), nomenclature issues arise and confusion ensues. The net result is difficulty in getting these two worlds to interact, which plays very nicely into Microsoft's way of business.
As much as I hate to say it, perhaps Google is thinking along similar lines.
Or anyway, that's sort of the shoe people are trying to make them fit, it seems.
silly web2.0 fanboy, tags are for kids!
the only permanence in existence, is the impermanence of existence.
This pissy little fit over terminology is news? This is the sort of thing I react to with passive-agressive glee: I'm gonna call them labels from now on.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
Debian's packages were originally arranged only by categories and sub-categories. But with so many packages the categories have filled up. Also there can be ambiguity as to which sub-category packages fit into.
One issue they ran into with tagging was that single-word tags don't have enough context. eg if something is tagged "python", then does this mean implemented in python, a package for python developers, or otherwise related to snakes? (a person looking for games written in python shouldn't be innundated with results for python libraries, documentation, utilities, etc).
Also there were concerns about quality and redundancy of user-generated tags (eg, Amazon with green, environment, etc), so there is a group which decides which official tags to add. If a person tagging Debian packages can't find a tag they want, they add "todo" tags until an appropriate, clear (and non-ambiguous/redundant) tag gets added.
More info on the subject here:
http://debtags.alioth.debian.org/
Why is Google using inconsistent terminology in its products for such an important term? Is there a real difference between a tag and a label?
Probably because they already use "tags" as jargon for something internal to their search engine database. Using the word "label" for HTML tags is probably just something they do on a day to day basis now, just for clarity on their own turf.
Essentially: Nothing to see here, move along folks.
Q1: Why is Google using inconsistent terminology in its products for such an important term?
A1: google.
Q2: Is there a real difference between a tag and a label?"
A2: labels, tags. whocares.
[+] slownewsday, google, labels, tags, whocares (tagging beta)
Politicians and Pedophiles: Two groups of exploitive bastards who are most dangerous when they're thinking of children.
Hi,
Both "tags" and "labels" may actually compete "concepts" from the ontology-based Artificial Intelligence world, as represented by the W3C RDF (Resource Description Framework) for example.
Basicly, the RDF stuff doesn't work because it requires everybody to agree on the very same ontology in order to allow conclusions beyond a single web site. Tags seem to be easier, they might be similar across sites with a bit of good luck.
The guys from Google have probably the highest AI budget in the world, so perhaps they could apply some of their statistical/ stochastical/ whatever AI algorithms with labels and interpret labels in a "context" in order to implement this famous "show me what I mean" feature. That would be a good reason not to call it a stupid "tag"...
I'm really interested in this stuff because we're planning to implementing something similar in our project management system. Please let me (http://www.project-open.com/) know if you've got an opinion or hints for us...
Cheers,
Frank
Why is Google using inconsistent terminology in its products for such an important term? Is there a real difference between a tag and a label?"
They are getting big like MS and are testing their infuence on the market. Quick, do you save the location of web pages as Bookmarks, or Favorites?
Same thing, new player.
The truth shall set you free!
GMail is an email app. Traditional email apps don't have tags. They do have labels.
"Label" is a perfectly consistent term in the world of email, where "tag" is not.
Honestly, was anybody now involved with this Web 2.0 stuff online more then 2 years ago?
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
so long as they leave out those awful tag table things with the different text sizes. How I HATE those awful things!
sulli
RTFJ.
Just to clear up some confusion:
1) Tags are the plastic thingees which are placed through the ears of cattle so they can be tracked all the way to the slaughter house.
2) Labels, on the other hand, are applied to people to define who they are and what their role in life will be. They even are used to determine things such as job opportunitys or what sentencing guide guidelines are used.
So, would you rather be labeled or tagged?
HTH
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
Google is being inconsistent! Get back in line camrade!
And that emacs client is way older than any of the ones you mentioned, and significantly older than the web. See the description of labels in the manuel.
I agree with your conclusion, gmail is just using standard decades old email terminology.
To me, label is different than tag, although I don't see a point in users getting their panties in a twist over the distinction. A tag is an association of a word (a database key) with data so that you can search on the tag and pull up the data that has been marked. Currently, this process describes both what the users are doing, say with gmail, and presumably what the software is doing on the back end. However, I can think of any number of ways the experience can be extended for users, while retaining the same architecture. For instance, consider a shared email system. One might define tags like "Support" and "User feedback", and when emails are applied with by these tags tags, are automatically assigned other tags, such as department or user that should handle the email. At this point, there isn't such a clear 1-1 relationship between what the user is doing, and the system is doing, making it appropriate that a new word be added. Labels are more abstract, and are what users do; tags are concrete and are how labels are implemented.
exceptio probat regulam in casibus non exceptis
Tags are a case where ad hoc user input simply doesn't work.
Perhaps "labels" will be a system where there is a) a better interface for creating them and b) likely some kind of "smart" help where Google (or whoever) suggests some labels for you to begin with, and automagically corrects your labels to things that already exist when appropriate.
if this was an issue of microsoft wanting to call some technology/concept by another term all you fags would be screaming that they're trying to dominate the market and must be fought at all costs.
fucking hypocritical cunts.
tag : just a word ...) : objects
label : something that could be used to qualify several things (ex: relations, group of,
See http://snipsnap.org/comments/Label, People.
--
Take care
Have a nice year
Fight fear and violence
ased
You might as well ask why you can't address a letter to
and expect it to get to the White House. But that is not the canonical form of the address. Postal addresses are formed by strict rules promulgated by the postal services of the world, to facilitate getting mail routed to the right location. In order for this hypothetical letter to actually be delivered, it's going to require someone figure out what the real address was, and slap a label with it over the wrong one. In your example, a search function like Google Desktop or the venerable locate command might be helpful, in finding the actual address, as would renaming pic001.jpg to something more meaningful like "Alice, Bob, Carol, and Dave (Christmas 2006).jpg".The number '2006' is only a year in the Gregorian calendar if that's what you're using as the basis for creating subdirectories. It may be the street address of the hotel you visited, or a serial number created by a digital camera. The words 'pictures', 'trip', and 'Christmas' have only the meanings that we humans happen to ascribe to them. The whole point of 'tags' or 'labels' is precisely that it takes a human to do the tagging or labelling.
To me the distinction between the words is this: When I put one or more 'labels' on a thread in Gmail, that's for my personal convenience. Whether any other person would find those labels meaningful is irrelevant. When I put a 'tag' on a story on a web site, it's to communicate that metadata to other humans, via their computer agents. In order for the latter to work, we have to have some kind of agreement on those tags. It wouldn't do for the tag 'trip' to describe physical travel, what Dick Van Dyke often did during the opening credits to his classic television show, an altered state of consciousness (whether induced via pharmacology or psychosis), or the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights.
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
Way way back, before computers, before the internet, even before automobiles, there used to be buildings called "Libraries". These buildings contained lots and lots of books. Most had a large case of cards called a "Card Catalog". Each of these cards contained information about a particular book, and one of these pieces of information was a list of important words, "Key" words as it were. One part or case of these cards would be called a "Keyword index" and would let you use these "Key" words to find books containing them.
Welcome to the 19th century, boys.
-- Too lazy to get a lower UID.
Tags are ... "hip", tags are techorati and Web 2.0 and hey you just .... tag!
... have you ever seen Google do anything hip? Even inadvertently? (Evidence must be provided.)
Whereas labels are something my grandmother used to sew on the back of clothes, or paste on canning jars.
Okay
I win.
or better yet, metadata.
Metadata-beta, that's sounds cool.
It is just like any other kind of marketing.
Many websites have haphazardly implemented tag systems that are little more than a novelty (I'm looking at you, Slashdot tag system)
Google, IMO, uses Labels perfectly and they are actually a useful part of the gmail system.
If Google called them tags then people might think "Oh I've used tags before and they aren't anything special, or anything I want"
Google doesn't want people thinking that.
It is just like how iPod has sort of become a generic term referring to any portable DAP but Apple is trying to prevent that because they don't want someone thinking of some other companies crummy hardware when they think iPod.
I would like to propose that henceforth the term label shall be applied to an item by it's owner or creator, whereas the term tag shall be applied by other persons. This would be particularly useful in a public site like Flickr where someone might 'label' their photo with a term relevant to themselves only (such as the name of their car, should they have named it) whereas another person, to whom the label is meaningless, may wish to 'tag' it with the more general term (in this case, car). Then facilitating the ability to search both labels and tags independently would be an added bonus for all using the site.
In many respects, especially on an electronic medium, labels and tags can be considered synonyms. This article is an example of making a mountain out of a mole hill, as the old expression goes. But it sure makes for some fun reading. The stupidest stuff often does.
You got Labels in my Tags!
You got Tags on my Labels!
Two great things that go great together.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/beowulf/clusters /
for a minute there, i lost myself...
For what it's worth.... just throwing this out here.
Yojimbo (Mac-only 'information organizer' by Barebones Software) uses both 'labels' and 'tags' with its items.
Items can only have one label. A label has a highlight color associated with it. Items can have one or more tags, and of course items can have both a label and tags.
The 'label' option existed before the 'tag' option. I presume it's modeled on the Finder labels in Mac OS (a file or folder can have only one label and it's visible thanks to a highlight color).
Disclaimer: no affiliation with Barebones software; just a satisfied customer.
JP
I see it as tag's are for public use, i.e. when you tag something its so others can see what you classify it as, and as the tags build you can see what the public think it is.
Labels are for private organisation, not shared, and possibly nonsensical to outsiders.
I'm sure any inconsistency within Google will be eradicated in time.
----- I refuse to have an argument with an unarmed person
While you're correct that lots of people misuse the term "tag" when it comes to HTML/XML, there is a construct called a "tag": it's the syntactic construct that marks the start and end of an element. A non-empty element consists of a start tag, some content, and then an end tag. (though in HTML the end tag is often optional and implied.)
Google is an ad company, maybe they want "labels" so they can market "Labels" on a for fee basis, with them used in searches? As opposed to tags, that everyone uses, and then, become a more hardly marketable term? Say the google engine can give .001 relevance to a tag, and .01 to a Label, and change for really good label results...
Sometimes it pays not to follow the crowd.
Label! You're it!
please... let me sleep... a little more... yay, no longer annonmyous coward.
The question isn't "Why doesn't Google use the sacred Web 2.0 terminology?" The question is, why did all the Web 2.0 flunkies start using "tag" in place of "keyword"? What's wrong with calling them keywords? That's what they are. Why a new term to refer to the same thing we've been putting on Web pages since the beginning?
It's just that gmail came before the name 'tags' became popular.
People will call them...well, whatever it is they call them, and the terms all mean more or less the same thing. When I post in my Wordpress blog, I select some categories for the post. When it x-posts them into livejournal, they are marked by these labels. But when my friends read the RSS feed, they sort by the tags so they don't have to read 10 pages of me geeking out about electronics...
Caveat Emptor is not a business model.
I've had significant trouble creating heirarchical filesystems for storage of my media which remain useable and flexible enough to last several years. Inevitably, I start saying, "where was that document I wrote for that one software project for that one class....?" Is it in
For example, I have digital photo albums for several things.
Family.
Weddings -- my wedding, family weddings, friends' weddings.
Vacations -- one of which was my honeymoon.
My dad has an even larger set of photos -- some organized by which child he was visiting (or they are pictures of), some by "$state trip $year", others by work project
I look forward to being able to have my filesystem be labelled (or tagged? hehe) in such a way that I can access my information (or place it) with several different ways of searching, automagically -- i.e., without creating a mess of symbolic links all over creation to represent all the ways I COULD view them
For a French reader :
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