On my site we are considering replacing our category structure with cross-cutting tags. To make this work, we need to be able to let users see and set the tags they are watching, as they can now with categories. This will also help admins to make sure people are getting everything they need to be getting.
So the suggestion is to add a section to the user preferences page that replicates the category notification settings, but for tags. Start typing a tag in “watching” and it autocompletes. Select the X next to a listed tag and it is removed.
Perhaps an MVP alternative to this would be to add simple UI to /tags to allow users to show tags filtered by their notification level.
I am still exploring what tags is all about and how it works… my impression is that there is no way to tell what tags you are watching, or for admins to tell what other members are watching.
I don’t even know if the notification you get (and possibly the email sent out) because you are watching a tag indicates you were notified because of your watching settings on that specific tag. Needs some testing.
I don’t think that a wholesale replacement of categories with tags is a good idea. Rather, you should try to strike a balance. What clear-cut divisions in discussion topics do you have? Make those categories. Is there any important categorizations that apply throughout all discussions? Make those tags.
In fact, I think that unsupported-install should be a tag on Meta.
