Daily Kos is the best progressive blog that really is a large community with many sub-communities. DK4 is designed to make it easier for our many talented writers to reach a wider audience and to give us tools for easier online activism.
This diary explains the DK4 tagging system from a nontechie's perspective. Some kossacks have expressed concerns of intimidation or dislike of DK4. The upshot for me is that you can use DK4 exactly as you use DK3 and never learn about or use the many tools provided by DK4. The FP is essentially the same but has 3 new lists to find diaries that TUs (our new recent list), rescue rangers (our new community spotlight list) and FP'ers (our new Feature Box) think are good quality writing, hot news or interesting community projects.
But if you want to expand what you can now do at DK3, you might want to gradually learn about the new features at your own pace. There's no rush as DK4 is likely to be a continual learning experience. If you are involved with organizing projects, or participating in diary series or sub-communities, you might like the new tools designed to help us.
I had a little e-mail chat with Markos and elfling this morning to clarify a few issues with the DK4 tagging system.
The DK3 tagging system became a bit ineffective over time due to neglect. Here's our main tag page at DK3 that looks like tag jumble compared to our new DK4 tagging system:
The DK4 tagging system is organized with tools that make finding tags and thus diaries very easy. DK4 is still in beta testing at the DK4 beta site here.
"Master Tags" (or the Top-Level Tags)
DK4 has "Master Tags" listed on the bottom of the frontpage:
Master Tags "cover broad topic areas" so that "most diaries" will be covered by these tags. elfling, one of the DK4 programmers, explained that "it is not expected nor intended that every tag fits under a master tag."
Master tags are a group that I pulled out as being large topics that are political and get a lot of traffic. I went through the list of tags with counts, and I looked at every tag with over 2000 uses, and then considered whether they were long term, evergreen topics, and also compared them to US cabinet offices.
Right now there is no "Master Tag" for Civil Rights that could include Related Tags of both community groups/sub-communities (e.g., Black Kos, LGBTQ) and issues (e.g., racism, sexism, torture, human rights etc.) Markos explained that this was an "obvious omission," but the Master Tag list is now "incomplete" and a few other tags should be added before DK4 is launched:
We'll have a revamped master tag list by launch. Civil rights is an obvious omission. So is culture. There are a few others. If there is demand for a master tag that makes obvious sense, then it's no problem to add one. But note, not everything has to have a master tag. Where would you put Katrina? We're not going to have a "natural disasters" master tag. Just because your topic can't be categorized under a master tag doesn't mean it's not a valid topic, or not likely to become well-followed if the news cycle dictates it.
There seems to be some concern that community diaries will not fare well at DK4 unless there is a community Master Tag or Type Tag for community. Well, there are. For example, the community diary series of KosAbility can use the Master Tags of Education, Health Care, Personal or Teaching and there is the Type Tag of Diary Series, where KosAbility has it's own tag page, complete with the 6 lists described below. The Group functions are designed to assist community diaries/series/groups and the FP will have a new recent list to enable continuation of "live blogging." Community is the heart of DK, and experience thus far has been that Markos has tweaked DK4 to make sure community does not just survive, but thrives. A community Master Tag sounds like a good idea, but is not determinative of our fate.
New Tag Functions
elfling wrote a diary posted at the beta site that discusses The New Tag Functions.
One new function is that tags now contain their own information:
A tag can have a picture, a description, and links to the outside relating to the issue or topic. Tags can also be categorized by type - an event, a diary series, a place, a person, an election. With over 200,000 tags in the system, not every tag is going to be categorized or have an encyclopedic article - but over time, the most used and useful tags will end up being indexes for diaries and general information about that subject, not just what someone might have said today.
Another useful tool is that tags can be aligned with other tags so that the associated tags are not "separately collecting diaries:"
We can alias one tag to another, eliminating frustrations with spelling variations like "healthcare" and "health care". We can note that CA-Sen is associated with Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer and the state of California. It can also help with cases of people with name variations or people with similar names (inviting you to pick which George Bush you really meant).
Markos provided another example of the benefits of tag alias and association:
It just means that George W. Bush, Dubya, Chimpy, and 43 could all be made to go to the same tag page. Eventually, we'll use technology to get people to use established tags and fix spelling mistakes they may be making.
One new feature not yet installed at beta site is an "an interactive popup that will help you more easily select tags for your diary." This should assist maintenance of a functional tag list without multiple tag duplications.
This is the Master Tag page for Transportation and it illustrates the information provided in the DK4 tagging system: an optional tag image, optional tag description, hotlisting of tags, and "Master Tags" have "Related Tags" or subgroups of issues related to the substantive issue of the Master Tag. For the Master Tag of Transportation, the Related Tags include air travel, trains, electric vehicles etc.
The heart icon to the right of each Related Tag can be clicked to follow that tag.
Finding Tags: Most Popular and Most Followed Tags
On the FP of the DK4 beta site, there are navigating links across the top of the page that include a link for Tags.
This link takes you to the Main Tag Page that provides 5 lists of the most popular tags for today, this week, this month and all time, and a list of the most followed tags.
There is also a list of the "Master Tags" (but this list is missing the Master Tag of Congress) and a heart to click for following the tag.
Finding Tags: Tag Types
The Main Tag Page provides a list to FIND TAGS BY TYPE, which are generally subject tags of organizations, events or institutions:
Thus, if you want to find diaries about some of those evildoer corporations, like Blackwater and Halliburton, click onto the corporation tag.
If you are interested in any DK diary series, click onto to the link for diary series.
Last August, I wrote a diary to update our list of diary series for our FAQ page. My guess is that the FAQ will be updated before DK4 launches, and thus this list of diary series will probably also be updated.
Finding Tags: Tag Search Engines
At the bottom of the Main Tag Page there is also a Search Engine for Tags.
You can search all tags, canonical tags, known misspellings, aliased tags, forbidden tags and uncategorized tags.
You can limit your search query to type of tags, such as diary series or corporation.
A second Tag Search Engine can also be found by clicking onto search on the FP, going to the Search Daily Kos page and selecting the search engine of "Search Tags."
It should be noted that there are 4 DK Search Engines: Search Diaries, Search Comments, Search Users, and Search Tags. You can also search for diaries that use a tag in the "Search Diaries" engine.
Finding Diaries or Diarists By Tags
The pages for Master Tags and Related Tags have 6 lists that help you find diaries or diarists that used one of the "Master Tags," such as environment, or one of the Related Tags, like water.
These are the lists available:
(1) Most Recent: A list of the most recent diaries posted with this tag.
(2) "Current Rec'd": A list of the "current most recommended diaries for this tag."
(3) All Time Rec'd: A list of the "all time most recommended diaries for this tag."
(4) Best of Tag: A list of diaries of "editor/rescue chosen stories for this tag." I think these are the diaries that have been posted in our new Community Spotlight or Feature Box on the FP.
(5) Prolific Authors: A list of "authors who frequently write diaries with this tag."
(6) Rec'd Authors: A list of the "authors whose diaries with this tag have the most recommends."
My assumption is that the "Prolific Author" list compiles the most frequent users of the environment tag at the top of the list, and then arranges the list in decreasing order of tag usage. This is not a dig at Markos, but he is listed as the first most "prolific author" for Environment tag. With LaughingPlanet's search skill assistance, I found out that Markos has used the environment tag 10 times in 7 years. Right now Markos assumed that the "Prolific Authors" list was "accurate" at least in terms of "the last time the database was imported," but I think he now agrees that there is perhaps a bug, and I have reported it to one of the DK4 programmers. [Within minutes of posting this diary, elfling informed me that this bug has now been corrected on the "development server" – now, that's a fast fix! And, this list will now "include a count of diaries on that tag by the user."]
Markos also mentioned how the "Prolific Authors" list can be used to recruit kossacks for particular projects:
Also, per question 4 -- we expect that the tag pages will allow people to find each other much better. Assuming the environment page isn't buggy, you just found a whole new batch of people focusing on your topic. Some of them may even be pretty good! It'll be great recruiting ground for group blogs, and for people looking for diarists to follow writing on issues important to them.
For me, an election writer, you better believe I'll be hunting through those pages looking for people who follow certain key races, and making sure they're in my stream.
Finding Tags: Hot Tags
The FP also has a list of Hot Tags located on the bottom right sidebar and this Hot Tag List is repeated on inside pages.
Following Tags
A click onto one of these "Master Tags" located on the bottom of the FP will take you to the particular "Master Tag" page, such as this page for environment.
If you want to follow the "Master Tag" of environment, you can just click the plus sign (+) located to the right of the word environment in the heading. (Markos says that the plus sign is actually a bug and will be replaced with the heart icon.)
If you want to follow any of the Related Tags, you can click onto the heart to the right of the name of the related tag.
Another way to follow Master Tags is to click onto Tags on the FP, and then scroll down the page to the list of Master Tags, and click onto the heart.
Your Most Frequent Tags
On the profile section of a diarist's blog page, you can see what are the most frequent tags used by that particular diarist.
So, any tips or questions about the DK4 tagging system? elfling will try to pop in to answer any questions.