Talk:Tag cloud/Archive 1

Spam links in Examples section
Removed '1000tag tag listing' as it was not a tag cloud, just paid-for links to advertisers. --- bigpinkthing 11:55, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Prior Art? History?
Any ideas on where the "tag cloud" or weighted list was originally conceived? 194.95.224.122 (talk) 00:14, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I published a paper in 2001 that referred to a system (CoFIND) that included weighted lists that looked and behaved exactly like tag clouds - see http://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/custom/portlets/recordDetails/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED466580&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=ED466580 I don't recall feeling that it was particularly innovative at the time (really just a variant on ordered lists with a bit of graphic zing) but cannot remember any earlier instances. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jondron (talk • contribs) 19:25, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

There is a similar idea demonstrated here ( http://www.phpinsider.com/smarty-forum/viewtopic.php?t=174 ) that predates flickr. As I was the poster, I won't edit this article. 64.231.34.112 (talk) 09:36, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
 * I don't think that can be classed as a tag cloud; although it is visually similar, the individual items are not Tags and their sizes are not determind by popularity. 84.68.116.211 (talk) 22:50, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
 * In retrospect (as the original poster of the question), I tend to agree with the above comment. Those aren't really tags and the weighting is based on hierarchical rank. Never-the-less, it is a similar visual picture -- but probably only that. That said, I wouldn't be surprised if certain popularizers of tag clouds had seen that page before implementing their own ideas. 64.231.139.48 (talk) 23:08, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Can we have an expanded description here ? I still can't work out what these cloud-tags actually are from the (well-written - but sparse) description.... :-) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Monojohnny~enwiki (talk • contribs) 16:44, 19 June 2006 (UTC)


 * What don't you understand? 202.191.107.197 (talk) 14:31, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Link collection?
This article seems to have turned into large link collection, it might be a good idea to remove all but the more essential links. --Bomkia 02:01, 4 April 2006 (UTC)


 * I whole-heartedly agree.  OhNo itsJamie Talk 15:59, 11 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Done. In the interest of keeping this article free of fluff, I have cleared out the entire ==External links== section, moved only a few examples from ==Examples== to EL, and cleaned out the rest. All those links simply aren't needed.
 * Note to future editors: the  ==External links==  section should not be repopulated with external links as it was prior to this edit. Wikipedia is not a linkfarm. See WP:NOT & WP:EL. --AbsolutDan (talk) 02:51, 5 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Are you going to call this a stub now? Dpd 13:18, 5 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm not a wiz with the wiki syntax, but is there any reason there couldn't make a static example of a tab cloud in the article? That would remove the need/temptation for people to add external links as examples. Pimlottc 18:18, 3 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Hmmm - maybe an image of a tag cloud would be simplest (and best)? I don't think it would need to be a working example... --AbsolutDan (talk) 04:12, 8 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Agreed. Examples of interesting uses of tag clouds should be described in text with citations to the external source or, in some cases, static images of the interesting use (if copyright allows). I'm purging the Examples section. Danielsteinbock (talk) 07:15, 11 September 2008 (UTC)


 * I broke the external links into two sections to distinguish examples from tools and resources -- tag cloud examples are innumerable on the web and lead to the prior link farm problem, tag cloud resources are more appropriate for external links -- Danielsteinbock 08:16, 14 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I've added an image of a tag cloud -- specifically, a portion of that used on Flickr. --Konstantine Simakis 03:59, 21 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Unfortunately this article is turning into a link farm again (typical of web 2.0 tech jargon articles, btw). Looking through the history reveals excessive flux in the list of Tag Cloud tools and examples, presumably as web app creators advertise their tool and delete references to their competitors. When tag clouds were a new phenomenon it made sense to link to application tools, but now that clouds are ubiquitous, tools have proliferated far beyond any need to catalogue them here. I'm going to purge the tool list, leaving only educational and commentary articles. Note to future wiki editors: this article's external links should not be re-populated as before this edit. See WP:NOT & WP:EL The list will need constant up-keep/deletion. Propose external links above on the Talk page when adding. Danielsteinbock (talk) 07:02, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Comprehension
I agree with the person above. I was fairly tired when I read this and I too had problems understanding it. I don't know if it'll be the same when I'm more awake but perhaps screenshots to demonstrate HOW tags work (or better yet, diagrams) might help the article. 200.108.27.63 17:45, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I tried to address some of the clarity issues in my most recent edits. It's a start, but the article remains a bit light on information and especially history. The reference to Flickr's role in the history of tag clouds is either incomplete or simply wrong, but I'll hold off on tinkering with it until I can find hard facts. Konstantine Simakis 04:04, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Editorializing?
I found that some of the article seemed to be leaning towards editorializing, rather than providing encyclopedic info, so I removed some content regarding suggested improvements for the usefulness of tag clouds. Some of the text to which I'm referring, though, also struck me as unclear (i.e., I sensed it involved opinion rather than fact, although I couldn't quite grasp what the opinion entailed). Feel free to review the recent edits, and let me know if you think I removed any useful information. livefastdieold 04:14, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

External Link Proposed Additions
Anyone has an idea why a link to a free online Tag Cloud builder was removed? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.127.236.200 (talk) 11:35, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

I would like to add www.etiketbulutu.com as an external link since it is the biggest tag cloud website in Turkey. Should we add it? 216.70.148.112 (talk) 23:32, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
 * All tools removed. See "Link collection?" discussion on this page. Danielsteinbock (talk) 07:02, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

more prior art?
How about the keyword cloud on http://runme.org/, which has been there since Jan 2003: http://web.archive.org/web/20030219192959/http://www.runme.org/. The tags aren't weighted but it does look like a cloud. worth a mention? Yaxu 23:02, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Image Clouds
I see an Image Cloud from chainofthoughts.com under the "Tag Clouds in the Media" section. If www.tocloud.com/cloudstore, which presents Online Product Catalog as an Image Cloud is unique enough, can it be added? I think there will likely to be more and more image clouds in the future that might warrant a separate page for it than mixing it with Tag Cloud. 24.5.177.161 (talk) 08:24, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Is the definition right?
I would argue that the definition of a tag cloud has moved on since this was first written and it's no longer a "a visual depiction of content tags used on a website", although that's probably it's original meaning.

I would use tag cloud more widely as a means of representing the frequency of occurence of a word or group of words in many different sources of text, of which tags on a website is only one example. In fact, a number of the external links in this article refer to the wider use of tag cloud in this sense. -- The blue worm 13:38, 3 September 2007 (UTC)


 * There are now sections on Data Clouds and Text Clouds, two divergent applications of the tag cloud visual form that have little to do with the social software origins of the term "tag cloud". Both of these sections need expansion and probable integration into the very unsatisfactory section called "Types". Danielsteinbock (talk) 07:45, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Incredible cluelessness as to Accessibility
All of these discussions (tagging/folksonomy/tag cloud) are disturbingly based on visual (rather than structural/semantic) presentation. It is imperative that as these new methodologies evolve they do so with awareness that there are lots of people being callously excluded from the game because of the exclusively visual attitudes in all these entries and the associated references. -- Love26 (talk) 12:18, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Oops, wrong edit summary on my reversion
I reverted an undiscussed external link to a specific bookseller by new anonymous user 64.201.248.10, and I left a msg on his talk page inviting him to discuss the link and read WP:EL. - Dan Dank55 (talk) 04:43, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Definition
What is the difference between types two and three of tag cloud ? It seems the same. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Krzsam (talk • contribs) 09:47, 30 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Type Two is based the total counts of the tags used. Type Three is based the count of unique items tagged with each particular tag.  If the site allows multiple people to assign the same tag to an item, these methods will result in different tag clouds.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.134.136.122 (talk) 00:38, 21 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Why is it that the definition and the history don't mention tag clouds created from paid-for words? This was started in 2006 by the http://www.1000wordpage.com, created by 2 students in London inspired by the. This was followed by a few others (500word being the most succesful). I think these are valid ways to use tag clouds where the size of the font is proportionate to the money paid to won that word. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Grigal (talk • contribs) 15:44, 3 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Doesn't seem notable to me.  PYRSMIS   22:53, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Computation of the tag size
This formula is pretty much arbitrary. There are lots of ways of scaling font sizes -- by area (font size ~ sqrt of count), logarithmic, etc. etc. Anything special about this formula? Is it widely used? Is it published somewhere? A formula with no commentary and no source is not very useful. If we can't find reliable sources showing that there's something special about this formula, we should delete it. --macrakis (talk) 13:34, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Revised- thanks. --KenanSulayman (talk) 10:55, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

This equation seems incorrect, solving for various tag counts greater than Tmin and less than Tmax results in a smaller font size that Tmin Catmanjan (talk) 01:18, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Text Cloud for Wikipedia's Entire Text?
I have wondered on occasions whether or not there exists a graphical representation of a text cloud which shows the frequency of words as they occur across the entire text of wikipedia (articles in their current state only). It would not be a difficult thing to produce, though perhaps time consuming, given the database size (I don't have enough disk space!) Has anyone heard of such a thing? Movis78 (talk) 10:43, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Proposal: the 'tag cloud' method has reached maturity
I just did a major re-write of the history section, my best attempt to do justice to the various forerunners and new usages of tag clouds in recent years. The gist is that it's a general method of visual design (weighted list) that got widely implemented as a specific kind of Web 2.0 widget ('tag cloud') that has since expanded to become a general method of digital text visualization (word cloud, text cloud, data cloud, etc.). Now that it has reached this kind of maturity, I don't think it's appropriate to catalog every new use of the method.

'''I propose that this article should evolve toward an encyclopedic definition of the history and general underlying principles of the tag cloud method (its usability, for instance, which has been widely written about in references linked from this article but not much in the article itself). Notable, historically-significant developments of the method should fit into the History section.''' Comments on this? --  PYRSMIS   22:01, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Criticism
I wonder whether there shouldn't be a short section on criticism of word clouds: they are an interesting statistical concept, but do they actually advance understanding of a particular subject? Or, to put it another way, they are technically possible but what are their actual uses in analysing complex issues? Using word clouds in, say, medicine, i.e. taking a medical text and analysing it using word-cloud-producing applications, usually produces a cloud with the word 'patient' having prominence in the display. So what? Isn't it rather the unusual concept (the signal, as opposed to the background noise of common words) which helps researchers to spot possible new lines of enquiry? I have analysed some texts discussing the etiology of gastrointestinal cancer or ulceration (GU): the possible role of an infective agent (here: helicobacter pylori) in the etiology of some types of GU cannot be found in any paper published before 1982.

To phrase it combatively: Word clouds may help outsiders to find out what's going on in particulat field, but only experts in the field can discover new lines of investigation by using knowledge, experience and 'gut feelings' (creative thinking) to discover new 'things'. Word clouds create statistical artefacts, but not 'meaningful' new ideas.

My reservations about word clouds are discussed in some blogs. I will look for more reliable sources to substantiate some of this criticism, and add a short 'criticism' section to the article. Sorry to go on bit. sleuth21 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.106.43.26 (talk) 11:47, 25 June 2011 (UTC) Sleuth21 (talk) 11:52, 25 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I like the idea of a criticism section and totally encourage you in adding it. My own criticism of a word cloud representation is that it is a proxy for summary but not 'stance'. For instance, an opinionated article about abortion may produce a word cloud that tells you it's about abortion but not whether the author is for or against it.  PYRSMIS   01:45, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

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