The one advantage that I really enjoy about our current tagging system is the ability to "ignore" a tag. For example, I follow briandmyers because I tend to really enjoy the content he posts to Hubski and I've enjoyed the conversations we have had quite a bit. That said, he uses the #kiwimusic tag quite a bit and I'm not a big fan of most of that music (sorry Brian). But, I don't want to not follow him because I really enjoy his other posts. So, I just "ignored" #kiwimusic and all is well. I also like creating my own tags like #tng or recently #rockumentary for the sake of archiving. I enjoy following tags like #writebetterdammit and #wheresthebeef too. There's a creativity to tagging and there's the ability to archive that I would miss if it were to be removed. It's also a great way for new users to be introduced to hubskiers. Even in the "real world" we meet people through topics and then come to befriend them through the breadth of their interests. Maybe you could only follow tags for so long? Then it's about following users only??