Web 2.0 - a Social Revolution

Web 2.0 Definition

It refers to a set of principles and practices that use the web as a platform for services that enable users to control their own data and media, and with a central focus on participation so that collective intelligence can be harnessed from distributed user communities.

Web 2.0 Features

Web 2.0 applications demonstrate one or more of the following key principles/features, but may miss others.

• Services, not packaged software, with cost-effective scalability.
• Control over unique, hard-to-recreate data sources that get richer as more people use them.
• Trusting users as co-developers.
• Harnessing collective intelligence.
• Leveraging the long tail through customer self-service.
• Software above the level of a single device - compatible with other devices such as iPods, PDA’s, cell phones, etc.
• Lightweight user interfaces, development models, AND business models.

More specifically:

• As a platform - the collection of pages still look like documents but are actually interfaces to full-fledged computing platforms.
• Provide services not products.
• The Network Effect: the service automatically gets better the more people use it. User adds value as a side effect of use.
• Architecture of participation: It is a community emphasizing participation, sharing, and collaboration with self-service.
• we, the media - a world in which the former audience, not a few people in a back room, decides what's important.
• Not places to go but things to do, ways to express yourself, means to connect with others and extend your own horizons - where we live.
• Two-way communication with the user: reading and writing.
• User-generated content - with enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow.
• Live Web - continuous changing
• Organizing the content by user tagging or folksonomy - a naturally created classification system which arises as a result of user-based tagging. A user tags an object such as a bookmark in order to remember it later, that information is then added to the global tag cloud and helps to create a folksonomy.
• Harnessing collective intelligence (using the wisdom of crowds) - turning the web into a kind of global brain. A collective intelligence is achieved when a critical mass of participation is reached within a site or system, allowing the participants to act as a filter for what is valuable.
• Can be administrated by just a few people (thousands of people not on the payroll actually building the thing)
• Data as building blocks for Web 2.0 applications
• control over data may be their chief source of competitive advantage
• AJAX is also a key component of some Web 2.0 applications to enable rich user experience as rich as local PC-based applications: interactive, participatory, as well as social.
• Easy to use: the entry bar is low.
• End of the Software Release Cycle: there is no need to install programs and patches; software is delivered as a service. Upgrades and future versions happen seamlessly, most without the user's knowledge.
• Spreading by word of mouth - viral marketing
• The Long Tail: Web 2.0 applications are designed to serve not only popular but fringe interests.

Web 2.0 Examples

• Blogging (weblogs) - just a personal home page in diary format with permalink to build bridges between weblogs - Blogger, LiveJournal, Movable Type, WordPress
• Vlogging (videoblogs)
• Wikis (for online group information editing)
• Social bookmarking (store URLs with personal comments and descriptive tags that will help users identify Web pages they want to find later.) - del.icio.us
• Photo uploading and tagging (Flickr) - can be found more easily later
• Video uploading and tagging - YouTube
• Podcasting (amateur audio sharing and downloading the audio file into iPod)

Others:
http://www2.writely.com/info/WritelyOverflowWelcome.htm (Web Word Processor)
http://www.housingmaps.com/ (Mash-up with Google Maps)
http://www.craigslist.com/ (Free Classifieds)
http://www.sxip.com/ (Identity Management)
http://evdb.com/ (Events Finding)
http://www.37signals.com/ (Simple Applications)
http://www.digg.com/ (News Stories)
http://www.friendster.com/ (Finding Friends)