An emergent culture model for discerning tag semantics in folksonomies

  • Authors:

  • David J. Saab

  • Affiliations:

  • The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the 2011 iConference
  • Year:
  • 2011

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Abstract

Social bookmarking sites as Flickr, del.icio.us, and CiteULike have incorporated the use of tags as way for users to retrieve photos, URLs, and citations in a way that is personally meaningful and which doesn't require learning taxonomies constructed by professionals. These tag sets, or folksonomies, have the potential to enhance interoperability among our information systems, especially those that use computational ontologies. Formal computational ontologies form the foundation for semantic interoperability, but seem to be insufficient in facilitating it because the ontologies developed for different information systems do not have an inherent mechanism for negotiating meaning or recognizing the natural evolution of a lexicon. Coupling folksonomies with formal ontologies holds potential for more productive semantic interoperability among systems. In order to reach that potential, we need to understand more clearly the process of discerning semantics in tag sets as entry points into the complex conceptual networks that generate meaning within cognition. This paper will explore that semantics involved in "emergent semantics" in tag sets and introduce an emergent culture model that will help clarify how folksonomies can be utilized in this endeavor.