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whats a tag?


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I've been seeing 'add tags' here on websites for ages. I still dont have the first clue what a tag is. So wot the @*%$ is a tag? and why do they need adding to messages?

 

if they dont need adding to messages, then why are we encouraged to add them? Where does one go to procure a tag from?

 

Its a tag a self perpetuating meme that nobody understands, but everybody pretends that they do so they wont appear stupid, gauche, unsophisticated, naive, guileless and a bit of a div? Are they something I should be concerned with or even alarmed about?

 

I predict that whatever 'tags' are, they will be boring. If that's true, please try to present them interestingly or I'm never gonna catch on.

 

Ta.

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  • 2 months later...

A tag is like a key word.  Adding tags allows robots like google the ability to sift through the data for key words which means when someone is specifically looking for "midi" or Variax and songstuff so it will produce exact results to the page of origin.

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I'm afraid that I am one of those divs that didn't have a clue what a tag is. I have noticed for a long time that I have been tagged by others on Facebook and other sites but didn't realise that it just requires a keyword. It's a little embarrassing that a 67 year old doesn't know what a tag is and that most probably a 5 year old does lol.

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21 minutes ago, Ray888 said:

I'm afraid that I am one of those divs that didn't have a clue what a tag is. I have noticed for a long time that I have been tagged by others on Facebook and other sites but didn't realise that it just requires a keyword. It's a little embarrassing that a 67 year old doesn't know what a tag is and that most probably a 5 year old does lol.

 

Ray, Mikes reply was pretty much what I was after. He could have written a technical summary that would have told me nothing more.

 

At 63 years of age, it delights me that someone senior to me is around! ;)

 

 

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20 minutes ago, Rudi said:

 

Ray, Mikes reply was pretty much what I was after. He could have written a technical summary that would have told me nothing more.

 

At 63 years of age, it delights me that someone senior to me is around! ;)

 

 

Only just still hanging around Rudi, I had a stroke last Friday and spent the whole day and evening in hospital having MRI and cat scans, heart monitoring, X Rays, blood tests, and am now on Statins and blood thinning tablets. I count myself extremely fortunate that it was a very mild stroke which has left my left hand, arm and leg slightly weaker than my right. They are probably functioning 70-80% of full capacity. It could have been so much worse because the lady in the bed next to me was paralysed down one side and couldn't string a sentence together bless her.

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9 minutes ago, tunesmithth said:

 

Since I'm even older than you are Rudi, that makes two of us ! :blush:

 

Tom

I notice you are not too keen to say how old Tom, Ha Ha

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Tom, It looks as though there are a few of us old and wise ones on songstuff lol.

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1 hour ago, Ray888 said:

Only just still hanging around Rudi, I had a stroke last Friday and spent the whole day and evening in hospital having MRI and cat scans, heart monitoring, X Rays, blood tests, and am now on Statins and blood thinning tablets. I count myself extremely fortunate that it was a very mild stroke which has left my left hand, arm and leg slightly weaker than my right. They are probably functioning 70-80% of full capacity. It could have been so much worse because the lady in the bed next to me was paralysed down one side and couldn't string a sentence together bless her.

 

Well I hope we've provided you with some motivation to stick it out now!

 

Seriously, that sounds like a scary experience, but you have been thoroughly checked out now, and of course improvement is certainly possible, albeit slow. So chime in with a progress report when you can (Tom's depending on it).

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6 minutes ago, Rudi said:

 

Well I hope we've provided you with some motivation to stick it out now!

 

Seriously, that sounds like a scary experience, but you have been thoroughly checked out now, and of course improvement is certainly possible, albeit slow. So chime in with a progress report when you can (Tom's depending on it).

Rudi, I had an extremely tough upbringing and have had many experiences in life that would have crippled many of less character. I am like a bull terrier with a bone when it comes to fighting for my life lol. I think I will be around for a while yet. [smiley=acoustic.gif][smiley=beerchug.gif]

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Tags are like key words, but significantly different....

 

traditional key key words on the internet were set by the page / site coder, and eventually by content authors where platforms allowed them to do so. In forums, contributors could not set keywords. In such environments keywords tended to be set on a site wide, or at least application wide basis. The same is true for many blog applications, especially if you do not own the blog site, like tumblr or the WordPress site.

 

What Mike says regarding search engines is accurate.

 

Keywords are still used. They are included in search and ranking algorithms but they are subject to abuse and used as part of search engine spamming techniques. This is why sites like Tumblr and WordPress did not open up keywords to blog authors, unless they ran WordPress on their own domain and server (no sense in tainting their own domain and server)

 

The most appreciable difference between tags and key words are that tags are publicly visible, key words are not.

 

For this reason, tags have become part of the navigation sites, often via the concept of a "tag cloud". The concept is simple. When someone arrives at a site, a view of the tag cloud is displayed on the site. This is a randomly spaced collection of tags, where the size, boldness, and sometimes the font are varied according to tag popularity. The bigger and bolder, the more popular the tag. For example if tag1 is used 20 times, and tag2 40 times, in the tag cloud tag2 will be a larger font and bolder font.

 

Tag clouds are also clickable, generally taking you to a list of posts using that tag, often ordered by date or popularity.

 

Tags also allow you to see what a topic is about without going and reading the whole topic. When Songstuff is busier this could be very useful.

 

Tags are also related to, but not the same as hashtags... though for convenience and uniformity it can be wise to include a hashtag as a tag. 

 

Hashtags are are publicly displayed within topics. On many platforms they are clickable and will display a recent posts or popular posts list of entries displaying that hashtag. Importantly, hashtags have no spaces, for example #ilovesongwriting

 

Hashtags are popular with microblog platforms like twitter.

 

When writing a forum post it is a good idea to include tags. If you choose a hashtag too, remember to include it within the body of your post, and encourage people to use it if they tweet about your post... it is quite suited to promo purposes.

 

One important aspect of hashtags and tags is their ability to visibly display trends. That can be very useful if you are trying to be on trend, topical and measure the success of your posts, to take part in trending topics and leverage off that popularity. Artists, celebrities and businesses, even politicians use them in this way. To associate what they are talking or singing about with an event (good or bad), and is especially used in cause based promotion. So for example, if you are releasing a song where you are donating money to Help For Heroes, then including the hashtag #helpforheroes in your posts and tweets is a good idea, especially near the beginning. Including the tag "help for heroes" would also be suggested.

 

I don't think tags and hashtags are just for promo. Far from it. They are for improved awareness, and most topic writers, blogger, poster, wants better awareness of their content, so that those interested In a topic will take part.

 

I hope this helps.

 

Cheers

 

John

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Hey John,

 

Thanks for the full explanation but my old brain would appreciate some examples please.

 

Supposing I had a song title "Crabs in the kitchen"

 

What would I put as a tag in the tag box?

 

I am not great at this kind of thing.

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It comes down to how you want people to find your post... and that also depends on context, including if it is something you are actively, purposefully promoting (though as an artist there is a case for making almost everything you post in this category.

 

As an artist, your song title is often your main hook, and therefore the element you want listeners to take from hearing it so they can go searching and find you and your music.... so having a tag that would be "Crabs In The Kitchen", with a hashtag of #crabsinthekitchen. However you may have a general tag you use with all your stuff such as "Songs by Ray Fry" or "Ray Fry Sings". You may find it beneficial to have more than one hashtag too, like #songsbyrayfry. 

 

On on a general music forum you may also want a tag that tells the listener about genre like "Singer / Songwriter" "Acoustic Pop" "Unplugged".

 

in addition on a forum like Songstuff, on the critique boards, you may also want to indicate the kind of feedback you want on the critique boards "words and music", "recording and production" etc.

 

on Songstuff only the first 3 or 4 key phrases will display unless the reader expands the keywords to see them all. Note that is key phrases not key words. Key phrases being collections of keywords separated by commas... often key phrases are still simply referred to as keywords, so you would have:

 

crabs in the kitchen, Ray fry, pop, acoustic, new release.   

 

As say say your key words for an announcement of a release. Within the post body, try and use those phrases too, but it isn't essential. Also in the post body, use your hashtag... #crabsinthekitchen #rayfrymusic

 

and maybe your twitter name @rayfry for example (though on our forums that would link to a forums member called ray fry, so if you want to embed the link to your twitter use the add link button when typing, and add both link and displayed text... to avoid confusion. :)

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Thanks John, That was very helpful :001_smile:

 

I just need to write a song titled "Crabs in the kitchen" now lol.

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