Dear Amy: The #SMEtiquette of Tagging Photos

 I've always found it odd that people would tag themselves in photos they weren't in. Has this ever happened to you?Don't forget: Submit your questions! 

Dear Amy:One of my cousins posted a whole bunch of fantastic old family photos on Facebook. I wanted to make sure I could easily find them, so I tagged myself in them. She removed all my tags. Why?Tireless Tagger

Dear Tireless:It sounds as if you were not in those fantastic old family photos. Tagging usually indicates that you’re in the photo. This can prove confusing to others looking at the photos.If you really wanted those photos, you could have downloaded them, if the privacy permissions allowed. And if your cousin doesn’t allow downloads from her profile, you probably could also have sent her a note asking if she’d send you copies of those photos.The problem with what you did is that other family members looking at the photos would see your tag and think, “Oh! Tireless is in this photo, which one is she?” But no one in the photo is female. Then they get confused, and ask your cousin why you’re tagged in the photos.Then your cousin has to explain that you tagged yourself and ends up having a whole confusing conversation with your relatives, who might not understand how the whole tagging thing works anyway. Instead of you just downloading the photos so you have access to them anytime you want.Basically, it's a matter of being courteous of your cousin - it's one thing to tag photos with people who are actually in them. That's often a nice and helpful thing to do. But tagging yourself just because you want to find the photos? I'm sure your cousin would be more than happy to share, seeing as she's already uploaded them to Facebook.