[Sigia-l] Taxonomy open to all - was: Difference between Taxonomies and Classification / Classification Schemes

[Andrew McNaughton]

On Sun, 22 Feb 2004, gunnar wrote:

> Taxonomies are controlled vocabularies.
> I agree (could you not agree?)

Sure.  A taxonomy is a hierarchical system of classification classes.
While there's an assocaited vocabulary, and in many cases this is strictly
controlled, the two notions are basically orthogonal.

> But I have seen - in a community working on an open source content
> management/community system  (www.drupal.org) - the use of the term taxonomy
> attached to a vocabulary (taxonomy) system - accessible by all users so that
> any person could add terms. I realize that this use of the term was perhaps
> due to a lack of understanding of it, but it seems that there's a trend toward
> distributed, shared and user controlled systems.
>
> How controlled is that?

Pretty much all controlled vocabularies are extended over time.  Sometimes
there's more people on the comittee than others.  The essential point of a
controlled vocabulary however is that there is (at any given time) a
defined and finite list of terms.

> My question is: "What makes a vocabulary controlled?"
>
> My first reaction was: "Now if the controlled vocabulary is controlled by
> everybody it will run amok - and cease to be controlled and therefore become
> useless little by little ..."
>
> As I have a soft spot for anarchy and bottom up, I'm in a bit of a pain here.
> I would like a scheme which would allow for such an approach to taxonomy
> building, but I'm hard pressed to defend the feasibility of it. My best guess
> is still, that it will not work.

You could just use an unstructured set of pages and a search engine.  I
suspect that if you ask yourself why you want something different to this
then you will discover the reasons why you wish to impose structure.

> Is a controlled vocabulary - controlled by anyone who chooses to - still a
> controlled vocabulary? Can it be usefull?

Probably.  Many of the users are likely to be quite capable people.

Andre McNaughton

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Andrew McNaughton           Currently in Boomer Bay, Tasmania
andrew at scoop.co.nz
Mobile: +61 422 753 792     http://staff.scoop.co.nz/andrew/cv.doc