Titles and formatting

[trascendenza]

So, I think about titles and formatting A LOT. I really like accounts that have consistent titling practices that make it easy to scan the bookmarks, but of course, since I want them to look *just right*, I'm constantly changing mine and unable to decide what looks best

Comments

[trascendenza]

I couldn't resist! It's nice not to be laughed at, for a change, as generally happens when I post this stuff to my journal. *g* I've been trying to figure out the best way to title things at this account http://del.icio.us/haikuathon for the longest time--like, are the brackets worth putting in? Because I don't think I can get people to post the haiku comments with brackets in them, so likely the bookmarkers would have to do it by hand unless there was a script that would do it, and that seems like an extra pain when it's already so intensive to bookmark hundreds of tiny commentfics.

Hmmm, the allcaps FIC preface. I like the idea, but I don't think I can get all my prefaces down to three letters, and for some reason, if I'm going to use them, I'd be irritated if they weren't all 3-4 letters. Like PICSPAM in allcaps would unreasonably annoy me. Maybe MEDIA would be a better category even if it's five letters, but also that's so all-purpose and wouldn't tell me at a glance what the bookmark is. I guess I'd really just have to figure out what all the different categories are in the first place. It looks like my most used tags right now are fic, picspams, meta, video, howto, reference, and tools.

...oh, God, no wonder I was avoiding thinking about this. Categories are too hard! Like the howto tag seems essentially useless the more stuff I tag with it, and tools would not make a good preface at all. Maybe my categories will somehow align with bundles, like TECH or, hmmm, I can't think of a short abbreviation for "internet stuffs." Perhaps the core problem here is I'm simultaneously trying to figure out formatting for fannish stuff & non-fannish stuff.

[catechism]

internet stuffs = "web" ?

Though I do see why you'd want everything to be roughly the same length if you were using allcaps. What about: FIC, ART, META, PICS, CAPS, VIDS, REF, WEB, TECH... ? DOCS? Tools you could subdivide, into like APPS or whatever. And I think for how-tos, it would really depend. It wouldn't be useless if you could keep it to honest-to-god tutorials, I don't think, but sometimes that's hard to do. So, probably docs for just straight-up documentation, and howto for shit with step-by-step instructions and screenshots and stuff.

But yeah. Categories ARE hard. I keep fucking with my fandom bundles for this exact reason. Like, TeenDramas. Do I put movies in there, like Breakfast Club and Mean Girls? Or leave it for TV shows and put the movies in a Small Movies fandoms bundle? Blargh, I don't know. And what the hell is a 'Prime Time Soap,' anyway?

[trascendenza]

WEB! You are brilliant.

I fiddled around with a few formats and was really surprised to find that I was gravitating towards an all lowercase one and I HAVE NO IDEA WHY. Before the internet I *hated* all lowercase but when I was fiddling I kept finding all variations that featured capitals too hard to skim quickly. !!

I still haven't come up with any kind of concrete categories. I think the problem with my non-fannish categories is that they're constantly changing. Fandom has set categories and even the ones I don't consume that much of I still have the proper word to label them with. But, like, articles? Random blog entries that aren't quite articles and not quite resources and not quite picspams but are also all three? Things that have more than one category are also problematic for fannish bookmarks, like, say, fanmixes that have fic written with them or a post on LJ with a vid and picspam and random meta. I can't have three prefixes for one bookmark! It would break my whole system (that only exists in my head)!

Hmmm, well, I would think that TeenDramas would encompass any drama featuring teens. It doesn't sound like an exclusionary term? SmallFandoms is such a large potential bundle, though. Maybe "Misc Small Fandoms" is more what you're thinking it is? Misc Movies Fandoms? TeenTVDramas? The issue might be how inclusive/exclusive you want your genres to be.

[murklins]

Yes, I still think the all caps link type is a valid and pretty choice and I was going to suggest abbreviations, but catechism read my mind, as usual.

I think for myself, once I get my script/extension things working, I will use the system catechism uses now, without rating: Title by author (pairing) [count] because even with a lot of fandoms and pairings, I think pairings are possibly sufficient info without fandom name. If you recognize the pairing, then you can probably ID the fandom. If you don't recognize it, you'll probably just skip right over it, which you'd probably do even if you knew the fandom.

I would tell you which of your formats I prefer, but I would probably just contradict my previous opinions on the topic. So fickle! I definitely prefer word count to be in there, though.

And I am going to continue to not worry about links that are not fic. I use a TOTALLY DIFFERENT format for them and it is crazy and senseless but I am AVOIDING.

[trascendenza]

I really want to make this allcaps thing work, but I can't seem to. I think I'm too non-fandom-category-nervous. Like, what if there's a category that I start labeling for that just CANNOT be abbreviated to toe in line with my other ones? WHAT THEN?

I can ID fandoms from pairings when I'm active in the fandom, but mostly I find it difficult. Especially the ones with generic names, like Alex/Ryan or whatnot. Alex from the O.C.? Alex from X-Men? ALEX SUAREZ? Ryan Atwood or RYAN ROSS? Not that a quick glance at the tags won't tell me, but I think I must have some kind of love of being confused because I have been known to sit there pondering that before even thinking to look at tags.

My preferred formats change about every .5 seconds. IT IS MADDENING.

I use a TOTALLY DIFFERENT format for them and it is crazy and senseless but I am AVOIDING.
HI, CAN I JOIN YOU? This is the hardest part of integration. Less splintering BUT MOAR ORGANIZING STRESS.

[murklins]

Yeah, I guess pairings don't work for everybody, but I have a hard time justifying to myself the inclusion of fandoms *and* pairings. It's just -- so much stuff in there, I have trouble seeing the title and author. And since most people read by pairing (such that yes, they obviously care about the fandom, but it is often the pairing *within* that fandom that they care most about) I would rather show pairing than fandom since I am apparently making myself choose. *throws up hands* I am talking about a system I don't even use!!!!

(Possibly I also have this secret hope that forcing people to seek more information than I provide in teh description will lead them to read my precious, precious notes. *is shameless*)

JOIN ME. LET US TAKE REFUGE IN MIND ALTERING SUBSTANCES AND FROLIC IN THE LAND OF SWEET DENIAL.

[trascendenza]

Ahaha, your precious notes! You know what I really love best about our del.icio.us discussion? All our secret little hopes and dreams come out in the weirdest ways.

The real conclusion I'm coming to with bookmarking ANYTHING in del.icio.us is that how much I tag and format will be exactly proportional to how much of it I ingest. Like, I bookmark craploads of fic, so I need a system because I'm somewhat regularly wading through craploads of fic bookmarks and/or wanting to export them in a pretty way. I don't bookmark that many links about writing a resume, for instance, so I give that bookmark one tag and do nothing special with it at all. It's like, I keep trying to come up with elaborate formatting schemes for stuff I don't bookmark that often, and that's why it's so hard! So I think I'm going to just obsess about my most used tagging categories and just settle for all that other crap not adhering to a system. Okay, wow, I totally think we were talking about this topic in another thread, oops, but funnily enough I'm pretty sure this is on topic for the original post which almost never happens!

[murklins]

My secret dreams are do unsecret these days: SEE PANIC! TAG THINGS! GO TO CHICAGO!

I think you're exactly right about concentrating your efforts on the kinds of things you tag a lot of. This explains why I have no system at all for RL links. In comparison to my massive fiction tag, they are completely inconsequential and barely register as needing to be organized.