Simple rules to keep tags and folders in check:
- Keep a flat folder structure. No more than two levels to improve findability.
- Keep a short list of common tags (main categories) and use it across everything – desktop, iphone folders, tags in blogs and social tools
- Add to that short list other tags as needed but always assign a tag from the short list
- On systems that allow both tags and categories (like WordPress), reserve categories for what something IS and tags for what it is ABOUT. For example, a category can be ‘article’, ‘note’ or ‘blog post’ and tags can be ‘gtd’, ‘creativity’, ‘health’, etc.