hey mike —

the 75% new tags number is consistent with the pre-tests done at The Metropolitan Museum of Art and in the beta version of the steve tager (reported in detail elsewhere (see http://www.archimuse.com/research/steve.html)

what we’re revealing is a significant semantic gap between the language of tagging and the language of museum documentation. my gut is that it’s reflective of the fact that art documentation is created by and for art specialists, not the general public. remembering my time in grad school, the LAST thing you talk about is the work itself!

if we agree that people search on what they tag, then yes, there’s a problem with access.

we’re testing that theory with search log studies (comparing tags to what people look for to see if they fill a gap). now that doesn’t tell us if searching is limited by what people hope they might find… but that’s a different question. i couldn’t believe the dearth of hard data about searching museum sites when i did the prototype study with Guggenheim log data.

seb’s work at the powerhouse is pointing us to ways that we can make tags and taxonomy work together in the museum space; we’re hoping we can add to that with what we learn at steve.museum.

/jt