Folksonomy as a design and digital curation resource in the context of information science

Abstract

The transformations of Information and Communication Technologies throughout the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century raised concerns with the representation of information in its various means of creation, storage and sharing, especially after the emergence of Web 2.0. Among the resources and forms of interaction in the long tail of the Web 2.0 platform, Folksonomy stands out, a form of indexing or categorization of informational objects carried out in a collaborative manner. The present study has the general objective of analyzing the importance of Folksonomy as an object of study and professional practice for Information Science. The specific objectives are to build a theoretical framework on Folksonomy as a theoretical and practical resource to be applied by Information Science; analyze different digit-virtual platforms that use Folksonomy, to understand its applicability in Web 2.0 platforms. This is a qualitative study, of a theoretical and exploratory nature. A bibliographic survey was carried out on the proposed themes and a literature review was carried out to constitute a theoretical framework that responded to the objectives of the study. To analyze the applicability of Folksonomy, an exploratory study was carried out in five digit-virtual environments that use Folksonomy. The results were obtained from the analysis of five Web 2.0 platforms that use Folksonomy: Flickr, YouTube, GoodReads, Bibsonomy and LibraryThing. From the analysis of the analyzed platforms, it can be concluded that Folksonomy is an important resource for Information Science - it makes technical processes more collaborative and enables new forms of analysis of interactions between communities of interest and collections of cultural equipment. Folksonomy depends on the performance of non-specialized individuals, so that a specialist, an information professional, is required to integrate collaborative practices in information units, such as harvesting. Based on the analysis of the literature published on Folksonomy, as well as the web platforms on which it is used, it is understood that it provides greater participation of communities of interest in general. Such participation, essential in view of the need for approximation between informational subjects and information professionals, contributes to the recovery, sharing and creation of new knowledge in a collective and collaborative manner. Although Folksonomy presents some negative points, these aspects can be solved through the work of information professionals in digit-virtual environments, with the aim of making them more efficient and effective, through disciplines such as Information Design and Digital Curation.