What is free tagging?

Question

Can someone please give me a proper definition for the term?

What I know so far is that it is an input box that allows the user to enter any data to categorize something. Is that it?

Answer 1

Free tagging (at least how I use it) is when you expose a field that lets a user add any tag to the content node. Essentially you are allowing anyone with permission to add a custom tag to describe the content as they relate to it.

This is opposed to creating a rigid hierarchy of categories.

The most common application of free tagging is to let your users describe the content and then create "tag clouds" out of the results.