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When one is asking a question related to social websites on Academia like the cases which are found by searching keywords like Facebook with almost 85 results, LinkedIn with 53 results, etc. s/he has only option to choose a suitable tag for the question which seems to be too broad for the purpose of the social websites and is not specific enough. There are also some other tags like or but none of which are so relevant to those question types.

Should a (or an equivalent tag) be created on the Academia and if creating this tag is reasonable, what would be a good Tag-Excerpt for it?

update and conclusion
After a few answers are posted to this question with positive vote rate; now, a tag suggestion (including the tag title, tag excerpt and tag wiki) for has been posted in this answer.

Please post your suggestions and comments to that answer to improve the suggested tag title and excerpt.

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  • Note that there is a facebook tag. And of the 85 search results for "Facebook" there are actually only about 16 questions, of which 7 mention Facebook only tangentially.
    – ff524 Mod
    Commented Jul 25, 2014 at 11:59
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    @ff524 what about other social websites like: LinkedIn, ResearchGate, academia.edu, etc.
    – enthu
    Commented Jul 25, 2014 at 12:05
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    While this question may receive down votes suggesting people do not think this tag is needed, I would like to say this question represents an excellent example of how to ask/propose a new tag.
    – StrongBad Mod
    Commented Jul 25, 2014 at 14:04
  • I would strongly recommend against a tag, and instead go the other direction: have only a tag called "internet". Let academia SE stay specific.
    – Mark Rosenblitt-Janssen
    Commented Jul 31, 2014 at 3:56
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    Please put your proposed excerpt in an answer instead of in the question, so that people can vote on it independently.
    – ff524 Mod
    Commented Jul 31, 2014 at 18:59

5 Answers 5

Reset to default
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I agree that it may be good to have a related tag. How about or maybe even better (or )?

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  • Does not media refer to other means too? I mean, media is also used for newspapers, tv, etc. We should find a tag specially used for Academic Social Websites.
    – enthu
    Commented Jul 27, 2014 at 17:29
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    @Parsa What are examples of social media which are not websites?
    – Tobias Kildetoft
    Commented Jul 27, 2014 at 18:06
  • @TobiasKildetoft I checked wikipedia and I also think social-media seems to be a good tag.
    – enthu
    Commented Jul 28, 2014 at 11:46
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If we are going to have a tag, I think the tag excerpt should describe social media in a way that reflects the kinds of questions people ask about it here. For example:

Use of social media (e.g. Facebook, blogs, ResearchGate) by academics to engage with other academics or students and to disseminate their research.

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  • May be we put your suggestion as excerpt and my answer suggestion as the tag wiki. I edited my answer, please check it.
    – enthu
    Commented Jul 31, 2014 at 22:35
  • @EnthusiasticStudent Generally on meta, we put one proposal per answer so people can vote and comment on things separately. There's no reason to edit other answers into your question or answer; if you agree with an answer, just vote it up, then wait a little to see what others vote. (That way, if someone disagrees with my excerpt suggestion but agrees with your wiki suggestion, they can vote on each separately)
    – ff524 Mod
    Commented Aug 1, 2014 at 6:28
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I would strongly recommend against a tag, and instead go the other direction: have only a tag called "internet".

Let academia SE stay specific to larger academic issues.

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Tag Title Suggestion suggested in this answer and this comment

After a few answers are posted to this question with positive vote rate, it seems that the is a good choice to be created.

Tag Excerpt Suggestion suggested in this answer

Use of social media (e.g. Facebook, blogs, ResearchGate) by academics to engage with other academics or students and to disseminate their research.

Tag Wiki Suggestion

Social media is a collaborative internet website through which users (both administrators and visitors of the website) can exchange and share ideas and information such as academic topics.

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  • I don't think this proposed excerpt reflects the kind of questions people ask about social media here, so it doesn't seem very helpful for deciding whether to apply the tag to a question.
    – ff524 Mod
    Commented Jul 31, 2014 at 20:07
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My preference would be to improve the tag wiki excerpt for rather than create a new tag. For example, the excerpt could be changed to:

Websites for a research group, conference, project, or individual academic; social media and academic community sites like LinkedIn, Facebook, PubPeer and ResearchGate; or sites and blogs about academia and higher education.

This, because I find it ambiguous as to whether certain sites are "social". It's easy to say Facebook is social, but is a blog social? What about a class forum on an online LMS? In academia, there are many cases like this where one person might categorize a site as social and another person wouldn't.

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  • I think your suggestion to excerpt edit of website is more practical. And, is there any need to merge existing tag for facebook on academia?
    – enthu
    Commented Jul 25, 2014 at 14:21
  • I guess where I think the line should be drawn here is ownership: are you responsible for the content and maintenance, or are you just a user of somebody else's site? There's enough of a difference there to make it worthwhile to keep them separate, I think.
    – aeismail Mod
    Commented Jul 25, 2014 at 14:46
  • @aeismail I don't think "social" implies that difference. And some kinds of websites can go both ways; you can be a reader of blogs about academia, and you can also write one. Is one "social" and the other not?
    – ff524 Mod
    Commented Jul 25, 2014 at 14:57
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    Perhaps "social" doesn't encapsulate the difference, but "website" becomes too expansive if it includes questions about self-run academic websites, external repositories, social sites, and everything in between.
    – aeismail Mod
    Commented Jul 25, 2014 at 14:59
  • As stated in the question, I also think that website tag is a little broad.
    – enthu
    Commented Jul 25, 2014 at 15:23
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    I would say the distinction between website and social-media is that the first refers to a unilateral communication channel (appropriate for, e.g., publication lists, contact details, presentation of research groups), while the latter refers specifically to bilateral channels. For example, a blog is a website as long as you only post content, but becomes social media once you regularly interact with your readers via comments.
    – Christian Clason
    Commented Jul 28, 2014 at 10:14

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