The first chapter of Everything is Miscellaneous, by David Weinberger discusses the idea of how much we use organization in our daily lives. Weinberger makes reference to alphabetically organizing subjects as completely outdated. He instead thinks the best form of organization has been innovated by Flickr. Users can tag images in a community, when searching for a image the search engine looks through all the tags and picks out those with specific tags. Flickr even takes this to another level not only can the uploader of the image tag categories but it lets other people tag the images as well. Tagging categories in order to organize has proven to be the most effective way to organize subject in order to sort through and find exactly what the user needs. |
| Periodic Table of Elements are grouped by the type of elements |
Order 1: We use this type to organize things as they are; we put "silverware in drawers, books on the shelf, and photographs in a album" (19 Weinberger)
Order 2: We organize things with a single tag or group them in a lone category. Weinberger uses a example of photos; a any photo pertaining to the civil war will be under the category "civil war", this includes images such as muskets, cannons, or uniforms that could be in the civil war era. A great example of this is the periodic table of elements
Order 3: This is described as the "digital order" as it was really utilized and innovated on the internet. This concept uses multiple tags on images to help users searching for a specific image will find it easier.
In Chapter 2, Weinberger looks at humans nature to organize things. The alphabet which in any sense of organization will most likely show up, in a sense it is one of the base methods of organization. But, the alphabet itself is completely random in the ordering of the letters. Humans have an innate desire to organize in some fashion. This really got my thinking about why the alphabet is order the way it is, why it has been so adopted by humans even though it has no real organization, and what are other things that have random organization?
This is a really nice post w/ great examples. Your specific references to the reading really help. I also love the images. Well done (just a wee bit late is all).
ReplyDeleteAs with you, Weinberger also made me consider the origins of the alphabet's order. Why is it ordered that way? I think a lot of Weinberger's revelations have given us a new perspective. I've now considered, because of this book:
ReplyDelete-Why is the alphabet in that order?
-Why do we use the Dewey decimal system still?
-What social institutions have governed the way we order things?
-What kinds of things have we ordered subconsciously?
-In general the little things in life we take for granted.
It's deep stuff.
I like your writing style, which is casual enough to be easy to read while still making all of the important points that were required by the assignment.
ReplyDeleteI also agree that flikr has the best organizational method. As an artist a system like this make it easier to get reference images to help in my work.