What is Web 2.0?
The question on many minds is simply, what is Web 2.0? Some will immediately scream AJAX! Others will tell you that it’s a trend in online business models, and cynics will tell you that it’s nothing more than a marketing hype. So what is it? And why does everyone seem to have their own theory about it? The aim of this article is to sum up what constitutes web 2.0, compare it with what is Web 1.0.
To understand what constitutes Web 2.0, we first must lay down some underlying principles of Web 1.0. Then and only then can we see what makes them different. So when the World Wide Web started out. Web servers were publishing static web pages written by few authors which contained hyperlinks to and from each other, this is what made it a ‘web’ in the first place. As the web began to grow, we began encountering problems with publishing content for others to read. We ditched the basic HTML pages, and began creating back-end code to produce dynamic content on web pages, and so it became easier to add, publish, and manage online content for what is now a much larger audience. Although very convenient, it was still the same, a limited number of pages, for an audience.
Now that things have moved a far way from dynamic pages, some underlying things have changed. The audience was always anyone who visited your website and was interested in whatever content you were providing them with. Something which differentiates Web 2.0 is that the line between creators of content and the audience no longer exists. With the multitude of blogs, online journals, and other content management systems out there, anyone can create and publish anything they like. The content is created, edited, rated, used, and read all by the users. With modern Web 2.0 services, each user can customize what kind of information they would like to see. This customizable approach brings what the user wants, when they want it, and helps them eliminate any excess information which they have no interest in. The only thing the web service provides is the platform and freedom to allow users conduct these actions, in the simplest way possible, making it highly customizable as well as user friendly. This is what I am trying to shed light on here, the new web will no longer have you bound by the limits of the website, the approach is to put the power in the hands of the users, and by doing that the business can see what works, what doesn’t and be given a further indication as to what direction to head to.
Another backbone of Web 2.0 is no longer simply providing a mere service for the user, but to allow the user to use your platform to create their own services for others. This is clearly seen in Google Maps, and the Google API. It lets people hack away at their code and use it as users see fit, there will be a lot of flops and useless tools made, but quite simply, what works will emerge above others. And Google benefits because these emerging ideas and technologies all rely on it’s mapping system as the backbone. This kind of idea is why I think it has been named Web 2.0, the fact that they simply provide a free customizable platform, and let the user decide how it should be used, and then that further brings useful services to a now massive audience, who will immediately either praise such a service or boo it off to the last corner of the internet. Many technologies such as eBay and Digg all follow this kind of philosophy. The software that runs them is only valuable because of the data it provides.
There are a lot of Web 2.0 technologies available today which we use without awareness of their 2.0 status. Here is a small list showing what is Web 1.0, and what is the Web 2.0 counterpart taken from O’Reilly:
Web 1.0 -> Web 2.0
DoubleClick -> Google AdSense
Ofoto -> Flickr
Akamai — BitTorrent
mp3.com -> Napster
Britannica Online -> Wikipedia
personal websites -> blogging
evite -> upcoming.org and EVDB
domain name speculation-> search engine optimization
page views -> cost per click
screen scraping -> web services
publishing -> participation
content management systems -> wikis
directories (taxonomy) -> tagging (folksonomy)
stickiness -> syndication
We believe in the cause of internet self-regulation, and quite simply, that is the course the internet is taking, we saw it as the only way, so did the open source community, and now big corporations are beginning to see it too. The best way to ensure maximum efficiency and usefulness of an online service, is to let the people determine that for you, by letting them bring their own ideas, let them implement them, let them write the content, let them have the power to tell you what to do, and you will see that what they want works. This I believe to be the whole philosophy of what Web 2.0 is. Trust the users to do what they want, and they will show you loyalty by being dependent on your open service while creating something which will bring the interest of others. In the end, everybody is happy.
Now that we know the philosophy of Web 2.0, we can begin to see how many different technologies come together to achieve these goals. RSS keeps you updated on changes and addition of content, AJAX makes web applications seem more like desktop applications, enhancing the look and feel of the way we use web pages. Blogs and community networking websites connect us all at an even closer level than they ever did before. These technologies are coming together from all corners of the web because those who are using them can clearly see what is working, and what isn’t. We, the audience are now active contributors to these technologies by simply using them. In a world filled with immense amounts of information, we are becoming more efficient at sorting, distributing, and selecting this information not because it is trendy, but more because we have to! How many people today would be completely lost if it weren’t for Google? The second we want to know something we immediately go to google.com and start punching in keywords to find what we want, and they have become so efficient at knowing what we want, and serving it up to us quickly, that we are not are so dependent on them for information. So now you see the close relation between the service, and the information it holds. We came from a web where the service was important to provide information, whereas now it is the information which gives importance to the service.
But we all know that all these technologies didn’t just come over night, and have come together from different backgrounds, and that Web 2.0 is not a big revolution as the Web 1.0 was when it was first established. We know that everything is growing in together gradually to provide information to everyone. So could the term actually be a marketing hype? Perhaps, either way however, they have brought to our attention some really good points about where the internet is headed.