On Keywords

A while ago, I was listed on the Swiss Weblogs Wiki and had a chance to update my profile. Stephanie who runs the list, mailed me and asked me to provide some keywords to go with my entry. I couldn’t think of any, so I let the matter rest. After a couple of weeks, she caught up with me on IRC at #joiito and insisted ;-) on me providing keywords. So I did - and I’m unhappy with the result.

I’m no fan of keywords - they usually are wrong. Same thing with the Taxonomy Madness (and I confess, I have a bit of it too here - see the categories). I have the constant feeling, that whatever I put in as a keyword or a category is ultimately wrong.

• Wrong, because it’s plain wrong choosen
• Wrong, because the keyword or category only captures part of the content
• Wrong, because I chose the keyword, and someone else (like you out there would have chosen something completely different)
• Wrong, because the item belongs to more than one keyword (and no, it doesn’t help to include two keywords)
• Wrong, because my conceptual framework changes over time and what seems right today, is totally off tomorrow
• Wrong, because it’s so arbitrary like a certain classification of animals (and yes, I do realize, that Mark knows this too)

Give me a tool, that get’s rid of classifications, but gives me access to everything I need to know and I’ll be happy man.