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In the beginning of this year, I made post about Matterdata, my made-up term for metadata regarding individuals.

The concept intrigued me so much that I spend this whole year developing a business plan AND entering a competition for it. It didn’t win (too pie in the sky). Just as it finished it, I realised that I took the wrong approach. It shouldn’t be centered on the individual’s attempt to “tag” themselves, but rather by other people’s desires to tag each other. We are already doing it, but just not “storing” it. It is called stereotypes. We have a desire to catalog people and put them in boxes. It makes our lives easier.

When @KevinRose tweeted yesterday about what Twitter lists are doing, it clicked. This is EXACTLY what is happening. Fueled by our desire to organise, we are actually defining people.

We are tagging each other, creating matterdata.

I’m currently in 11 lists and all them are lists that clearly define who I am: Stellenbosch, Music, Web-services, South Africa, techies, etc. Yes, these keywords clearly define who I am. I am all of the above.

If I look at my @tweeklyfm, half of the lists are in “music” and some if it “apps”. This is what it is. Brilliant.

I end with another tweet by Kevin Rose. Once these lists are established, several prominent figures will come to the front. Those that are tagged in countless “tech” lists for example, are experts or knowledgeable people in this field. This way, twitter can rank the importance of the social data. They are in essence ranking individual’s in relevance to search.

It’s becoming a totally new ball game. Something which will be incredibly exciting to watch. I wonder if Twitter realizes their own potential or if they just wanted to people to organize their streams.