Categories and Tags: Can They Play Nice?

In a recent housecleaning frenzy I have restructured the categories here at /Message based on a structural distinction with regard to tags. I am using categories — as supported by Typepad — as an indicator of the type of the post, and not a meta tag. What I means is that I am not basing the category selection based on what I am writing about, but the sort of writing involved.

For example, the category Writings refers to posts that describe writing that I have authored elsewhere, like on the Mircosyntax.org blog, or at Internet Evolution. Similarly, Critiques collects all my reviews and analysis of tools, conferences, or other products and services. My general default category is Commentaries, where I spin opinions on others tweets, writing, or the affairs of the day. I reserve Theories for my longer posts where I am trying to make a case for some deeper insight.

I use tags are to identify concepts, people, and products mentioned in a given post, like ‘twitter’, ‘social tools’, ‘scott karp’ and ‘the death of newspapers’.

So, categories here do not act as a clustering concept for tags — a meta tag — any longer. I tried that but it was unweldy, and it also did not yield what a short list of ‘type’ categories can.

Now, if a visitor to /Message wants to read nothing but my longwinded principles of social tools, she can select the Theories archive and dull her mind at great length. Some on interested in product hatred (or love) can wander through the Critiques section of the library. If you want to see my presentations, see Presentations. Various schemes and travels I have taken or plan? Plans, of course.

I hope this helps, because it is a bitch to go back over the thousands (yes, thousands) of posts and recategorize them. In fact, I am not remotely finished. I wish I could harness the crown or something, but the limits of Typepad make that impossible. So it will take me a few months, stealing minutes here and there, to clean up the mess.