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The case studies took place on three sites used by fans\u2013Tumblr, Archive of Our Own (AO3) and Etsy. Supplementary semi-structured interviews with site users were used to augment the findings with qualitative data.<\/jats:p><\/jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Findings<\/jats:title><jats:p>These showed that fans used tags in a variety of ways quite apart from classification purposes. These included tags being used on Tumblr as meta-commentary and a means of dialogue between users, as well as expressors of emotion and affect towards posts. On AO3 in particular, fans had developed a practice called \u201ctag wrangling\u201d to mitigate the inherent \u201cmessiness\u201d of tagging. Evidence was also found of a \u201chybrid market economy\u201d on Etsy fan stores. From the study findings, a taxonomy of fan-related tags was developed.<\/jats:p><\/jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Research limitations\/implications<\/jats:title><jats:p>Findings are limited to the tagging practices on only three sites used by fans during Spring 2016, and further research on other similar sites are recommended. Longitudinal studies of these sites would be beneficial in understanding how or whether tagging practices change over time. Testing of the fan-tag taxonomy developed in this paper is also recommended.<\/jats:p><\/jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Originality\/value<\/jats:title><jats:p>This research develops a method for using tag analysis to describe information behaviour. It also develops a fan-tag taxonomy, which may be used in future research on the tagging practices of fans, which heretofore have been a little-studied section of serious leisure information users.<\/jats:p><\/jats:sec>","DOI":"10.1108\/jd-05-2020-0089","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2020,12,31]],"date-time":"2020-12-31T08:10:04Z","timestamp":1609402204000},"page":"320-358","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":12,"title":["Tag analysis as a tool for investigating information behaviour: comparing fan-tagging on Tumblr, Archive of Our Own and Etsy"],"prefix":"10.1108","volume":"77","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-7747-4210","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Ludi","family":"Price","sequence":"first","affiliation":[]},{"given":"Lyn","family":"Robinson","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[]}],"member":"140","reference":[{"issue":"1","key":"key2021021707071786300_ref001","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"149","DOI":"10.1108\/OIR-03-2018-0093","article-title":"Social media analytics: analysis and visualisation of news diffusion using NodeXL","volume":"43","year":"2019","journal-title":"Online Information Review"},{"volume-title":"Women in Online Science Fiction Fandoms: Perceived Impact on Psychological Well-Being","year":"2019","key":"key2021021707071786300_ref002"},{"key":"key2021021707071786300_ref003","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"185","DOI":"10.1515\/9783110636628-009","article-title":"Perceptions and implications of user participation and engagement in libraries, archives and museums","volume-title":"Libraries, Archives and Museums as Democratic Spaces in a Digital Age","year":"2020"},{"issue":"3","key":"key2021021707071786300_ref004","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"528","DOI":"10.1108\/JD-08-2016-0101","article-title":"What people study when they study Tumblr: classifying Tumblr-related academic research","volume":"73","year":"2017","journal-title":"Journal of Documentation"},{"key":"key2021021707071786300_ref005","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"818","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-319-10951-0_297","article-title":"Understanding Etsy: social media and marketing within a community of sellers","year":"2014"},{"key":"key2021021707071786300_ref006","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"46","DOI":"10.1016\/j.dcm.2017.08.003","article-title":"\u2018Comments in tags, please!\u2019: tagging practices on tumblr","volume":"22","year":"2018","journal-title":"Discourse, Context and Media"},{"issue":"2","key":"key2021021707071786300_ref007","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"240","DOI":"10.1215\/23289252-8143407","article-title":"Pornography, trans visibility, and the demise of Tumblr","volume":"7","year":"2020","journal-title":"Transgender Studies Quarterly"},{"issue":"2","key":"key2021021707071786300_ref008","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"286","DOI":"10.1108\/EL-01-2017-0011","article-title":"Use of hashtags to retrieve information on the web","volume":"36","year":"2018","journal-title":"Electronic Library"},{"key":"key2021021707071786300_ref009","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"45","DOI":"10.1145\/2556420.2556820","article-title":"Values and negotiation in classification work","year":"2014"},{"issue":"6","key":"key2021021707071786300_ref010","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"627","DOI":"10.1177\/1354856516648084","article-title":"Technology, fandom and community in the second media age","volume":"23","year":"2016","journal-title":"Convergence: The International Journal of Research Into New Media Technologies"},{"volume-title":"3rd Ed. 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