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Kiki
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- #1
- Posted: 03/14/2012 00:01
- Post subject: Tagging (or genre tags)
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This has been brought up a few times in the past. Thought I will ask a few questions about it.
If anything like them are put into the website, how will they work? Like genre tags or "tagging" albums. Who gets to decide what is what? Will it be a few or would it be every user?
I do have some concerns for such a thing. Firstly, it reduces music into simple words which do not express all of which the album is about. Will words like "inspiring", "magical", "transcending", "poetry" be allowed? They would go a lot further describing a piece of music than "jazz", "rock", "indie", alternative". "Jazz" is the least vague one there and even that comes no where near describing all the different types of music which is labeled "jazz"  "rock" is the worst amongst them, "alternative" is... well "alternative" to what? And "indie" has seemed to have lost its meaning over time.
I'm pointing no fingers here but there are people whose music view only gets hindered by such things. And they will throw tags like "indie" or "alternative" at anything with a guitar without a second thought. Tags like "rap" and "electronic" will be used at any chance they can be used. There will come people (maybe as soon as such a thing is in place) who will want to pigeon hole everything in the top 1000 in one single sitting using the most mundane "genre tags" possible. They wouldn't have listened to half the albums but will instead base their "genre tags" on their preconceived notions of the music. Quicker than we know it... they will be the highest tags.
Finally people finding new music are going to look at the genre tags. They will look at them not to decide on what to listen to but instead what NOT to listen to. "Oh that's indie/alternative/metal... I won't listen to that." 
It's not that this website isn't ready for "genre tags", it's that most people shouldn't be trusted with "tagging genres". In fact... people shouldn't be using genres at all. It leads to bad things. People describing music with diluted words and hindering what others listen to. I see little good with labeling genres.
Is there anything someone would like to say in defense for them?
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RFNAPLES
Level 8
Gender: Male
Age: 75
Location: Durham, NC, USA
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RFNAPLES
Level 8
Gender: Male
Age: 75
Location: Durham, NC, USA
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Kiki
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- #4
- Posted: 03/14/2012 00:33
- Post subject:
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| RFNAPLES wrote: | These are the tags I use:
Blues
Classical
Comedy
Country
Folk
Gospel
Holiday
Jazz
Latin
Musical
New Age
Pop
Soundtrack
Various
World
Rock includes alternative, indie, rap, hip-hop, soul, R&B, etc.
Pop includes artists like Mancini, Sinatra, Streisand, etc.
Within categories/tags I keep things alphabetically by artist. |
They are slightly better than the ones I listed. Although some mentioned can convey some albums which are completely different as the same thing. People who then see the tags used that way may assume that, yes they are the same thing.
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RFNAPLES
Level 8
Gender: Male
Age: 75
Location: Durham, NC, USA
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videoheadcleaner
formerly Harkan
Gender: Male
Age: 38
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- #6
- Posted: 03/14/2012 06:53
- Post subject:
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I have these among the usuals:
Ambient
Grunge
House
Industrial
New Wave
Post-Punk
Post-Rock
Progressive Rock
Synthpop
Trip-Hop
These would be custom tags and I think there would be a stock 10-15 tags that members could base albums on.
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albummaster
Janitor
Gender: Male
Location: Spain
Site Admin
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- #7
- Posted: 03/14/2012 17:58
- Post subject: Re: Tagging (or genre tags)
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| an_outlaw wrote: | | If anything like them are put into the website, how will they work? Like genre tags or "tagging" albums. Who gets to decide what is what? Will it be a few or would it be every user? |
I think it's going to be tagging instead of genres. The implementation details, I've not thought through in enough detail yet. I've got some thoughts but they're not clear enough. Once I've finished delivering the membership ladder, my thoughts will turn to how to do this, and the details will get decided.
| an_outlaw wrote: | | I do have some concerns for such a thing. Firstly, it reduces music into simple words which do not express all of which the album is about. Will words like "inspiring", "magical", "transcending", "poetry" be allowed? They would go a lot further describing a piece of music than "jazz", "rock", "indie", alternative". |
I think this is the main reason why genres won't really work on a site like this, it won't be flexible enough and probably too many items would get tagged with the same things. I think a tag should be seen more as a descriptive label for something (although a tag could also be the name of a genre as well).
| an_outlaw wrote: | | ...They wouldn't have listened to half the albums but will instead base their "genre tags" on their preconceived notions of the music. Quicker than we know it... they will be the highest tags. |
This is an implementation detail. When it's time to add the feature, we'll discuss amongst us how this should work.
| an_outlaw wrote: | In fact... people shouldn't be using genres at all. It leads to bad things. People describing music with diluted words and hindering what others listen to. I see little good with labeling genres.
Is there anything someone would like to say in defense for them? |
yes, in their defence, I'd say genres/tags will make this site a lot more useful to a lot of people e.g. if you are wanting to find the best albums tagged 'acoustic' or whatever, you just filter a list of items having this tag. I've lost count of the number of times this has been asked for, so is definitely wanted/needed.
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Hayden
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RFNAPLES
Level 8
Gender: Male
Age: 75
Location: Durham, NC, USA
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Xavygravy
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- #10
- Posted: 03/15/2012 05:05
- Post subject:
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There's nothing wrong with 'generic genre tagging'. Most people will want this feature.
What you're concerned about is that these 'generic genres' are not specific enough; this can be solved with 'subgenres'.
The 'generic genres' would be a predefined list.
Subgenres could be by suggestion, as they're more volatile and new subgenres appear all the time.
Solved.
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