Taxonomy is the traditional method of organizing, storing and finding information. It is based on a hierarchical, single location, filing system that is created by an authority and the general structure does not change. Early examples of this system were library catalog filing cabinets that housed actual index type cards listing each book according to the Dewey decimal system so that the book location on the shelves could be found. When the world wide web was starting to get popular with the masses it tried to categorize the electronic information in a similar hierarchical fashion by using static folders, files, and links to categorize, store and find information.
By 2004 or so the world wide web became much more interactive. Information was being added at such a rapid rate, and the way people used the web was changing so that the hierarchical system for information was not effective. The new form of organizing, storing and finding information in the Web 2.0 era is called Folksonomy. This is because it is everyday folks that are the ones creating and organizing the information in ways that make sense to them. By adding tags to content ("content" being info or pictures that people create or come across that others have created) we are adding relevant ways to categorize and find that content when we need it later. Because these tags are shared each of us is helping others to find content as well. The content isn't stored in one location anymore but can be found using many different tags or keywords that make sense for the people who use that content. The organizational system is constantly changing as people add more content and tags. Despite having vastly more content, finding things we're looking for has gotten much quicker and easier.
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