I’ve had some recent fun with Tag Clouds. These are the sections of blogs that show the most frequently used words in blog postings; the most used words are shown in larger text, less frequent in smaller text.
Tag clouds are great summary tools. In my next presentation at the Specialized Information Publishers Conference in DC, I am presenting on The 7 laws of Internet List Generation. I thought it would be fun to start the talk with the first slide that shows a Tag Cloud of the most frequently used words in the PowerPoint presentation.
Then I started thinking. Broadlook will be recording the presentation and we will have a transcript of what I talk about. What will my audio tag cloud look like for the presentation? How will my audio tag cloud look vs. the presentation tag cloud? Will I stay on topic? In fact, what would the tag cloud look like if it followed me 24/7 recording everything I said? What about thoughts? Then I thought more. How many other situations could a tag cloud be applied? What about a website?
PDA’s are becoming so powerful that we are not far from a point where everything you say, over your entire life, could be transcribed and stored into a cyberspace tag cloud.
I’ll show you my cloud if you show me yours. eHarmony move over.
A simple tool such as a tag cloud used in non-traditional ways could yield some very interesting results.
I’ve often wondered how to select people on twitter to follow that are not going to post crap about what they had for dinner. Twitter are you listening? Create a tag could that is a summation of people’s tweets. Tags to avoid (for me) I, me, my, ate, food, dinner.