What's the difference between 'taxonomy' and 'folksonomy'?

If you’re like me you will be wondering what the difference between ‘folksonomy’ and ‘taxonomy’ is. A great article that I sourced titled ‘Constructing Folksonomies from User-Specified Relations on Flickr’ clearly defines these two often confused concepts. It is important to recognize that they are both common place on the web as ‘tags’.

“A  taxonomy is a hierarchical classification system used to organize our knowledge of the world. The Linnean classification system, one of the best known taxonomies is used to categorize all living organisms.” Taxonomy tags are added by content creators and authors.

Examples: 

•  Library Classification Schemes eg. The Dewey Decimal System 

• Web directories that categorize Web pages, eg., the Yahoo Directory.

“Unlike a formal taxonomy created by a small group of experts using a controlled vocabulary, a folksonomy emerges bottom-up from the bits of knowledge about the world expressed by many users using uncontrolled personal vocabularies.” Folksonomy tags are added by the consumer or reader.

  

Examples: 

•   Web sites that categorize personal photos eg. Flickr etc. 

References:

Plangprasopchok, A & Lerman, K 2009, 'Constructing Folksonomies from user specified relations on flickr', The Guide to Computing Literature, International World Wide Web conference, p. 781-790, viewed 19 October 2010, ACM Portal.