Web 2.0 - Beyond the Conference..

With its allusion to the version number that commonly designates software upgrades, Web 2.0 was a natural way to indicate the improved form of the WWW. With critics declaring it as a meaningless marketing buzzword and its existence hotly debated to date, let us focus back on Web technologies without engaging in meaningless arguments about whether there is or isn't a 'Web 2.0'. In this article by Ayanthi Anandagoda, she takes a look back at Web 2.0 and attempts to take a glimpse in to the future..
Date: Mon, 16th Jun, 2008
Level: Introductory
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Table of Contents

 

Introduction

Did you miss it? The Web is versioned!
The origins of the term runs back to year 2003 when Tim O’Reilly presented the future of Web as Web 2.0. Here's the definition from the creator:
"Web 2.0 is the network as platform, spanning all connected devices; Web 2.0 applications are those that make the most of the intrinsic advantages of that platform: delivering software as a continually-updated service that gets better the more people use it, consuming and remixing data from multiple sources, including individual users, while providing their own data and services in a form that allows remixing by others, creating network effects through an "architecture of participation," and going beyond the page metaphor of Web 1.0 to deliver rich user experiences."

Digging deeper into the topic, we realize that Web 2.0 is not a single groundbreaking new technology. Instead, it is an umbrella term that blankets a spectrum of Web 2.0 components ranging from more technical concepts such as SOA & Mashups to concepts such as blogs, wikis and tagging that are socially oriented.  In Web 2.0, users are not just consumers but contributors. Web 2.0 is 'writable' as opposed to the previously 'readable' Web 1.0. Web 2.0 trumpets a trend, in which, the Web is the platform for development and product offering.

 This article is largely a look back at the beginnings of versioned Web and just touches the future. In a future article, I hope to cover more depth on the envisioned Web 3.0.

 

Web 2.0 Feature List

With the browser as the desktop and software beyond the boundaries of devices, technologies, interface and context, Web 2.0 heralded the next generation of the Web that offered the ability for the user to participate - not just to watch from the distance. Here's some of the popular application types that contribute towards the Web 2.0.

  1. Blogs: Short for "Web logs" the term was coined in 1997. Blogs refer to Web pages that contain posts on a wide range of topics from cooking recipes to space shuttle navigation.

  2. Content tagging services/social bookmarking - These allow users to assign freely chosen keywords as a tags. We also call it social bookmarking when public bookmarking sites (such as del.icio.us) circulate such tags created by everyone else on the site. The frequency at which a particular tag has been used with an information system such as a Web page or a blog, is often displayed graphically as a ‘cloud’ in which tags with higher frequency of use are displayed in larger text.

  3. Podcasts/ videocasts/ screencasts - These refer to digital-media files that are distributed over the Internet.

  4. Wikis: Collaborative publishing that aims to harness the power of collective intelligence.

  5. Mashups: These are at the core of  the Web 2.0 generation that creates Lego-style software. Mashups can be created by remixing disparate contents in innovative ways and are a Web application that displays the augmented value of SOA services through composition. Mashup platforms enable non-technical domain experts to wire applications together and fuel the idea that the greatest achievements are made by what we create together.
    Mashups, whilst not replacing back-end IT development within enterprises can be looked at as an opportunity to take a new approach to building composite services by blending multiple sources of information for creating 'situational' applications.

  6. Tagging: The real value in tagging is that a community of like-minded people is helping to sort and classify information. E.g.del.icio.us. The frequency of this tagged information is often displayed graphically as a ‘cloud’ in which tags with higher frequency of use are displayed in larger text.

     

Enabling Technologies of Web 2.0

  • RSS - One of the things that has made a difference is a technology called RSS. One of the most significant advances in the fundamental architecture of the Web, the RSS technology allows not just the ability to view a page but to subscribe to it, and enable it to send notifications whenever changes are made to that page. RSS is a family of formats which allow users to find out about updates to the content of RSS-enabled websites, blogs or podcasts without actually having to go and visit the site. RSS aggregators will periodically poll the site, notifying you if something is new, and deliver that content.
  • AJAX - Encourages developers to split Web pages into compartments of data that can be refreshed independently of the entire page, and to write applications that act on data within the browser rather than on the server. The result is considerably less data and display information hogging the network and faster perceived response times.
  • SOA - Referred to as the next generation of distributed computing, Service Oriented architecture (SOA) is an architectural style that guides the creation of collaborative services that are loosely-coupled and independent of their implementation technologies. The creation of such an infrastructure gives rise to a new wave of IT, that brings IT investments more in line with business strategies, thus creating increased business agility.[3]

 

So What Does Web 2.0 Mean to the Business and Individual?

Exciting and buzzwordy, but how does Web 2.0 translate to delivering tangible value to the world at large? There are a number of renowned Web-based companies and applications that demonstrate the ability of the Web 2.0 concepts in making business. They include Feedburner, YouTube, Yahoo, Flickr, Odeo, Del.icio.us, digg and many others. Internet giant Google is at the heart of Web 2.0. More companies are being formed to get acquired and that is the Web 2.0 business model.
So, how good a business model is the newly versioned Web? Paul Graham, in his article titled 'What the Bubble Got Right'1 says, '... In fact most of the money to be made from big trends is made indirectly. It was not the railroads themselves that made the most money during the railroad boom but the companies on either side, like Carnegie's steelworks, which made the rails, and Standard Oil, which used railroads to get oil to the East Coast, where it could be shipped to Europe. I think the Internet will have great effects, and that what we've seen so far is nothing compared to what's coming..'

Here are some of the more obvious effects of the Web 2.0-generation applications:

  1. Rapid assembly of Business IT solutions with SOA and Mashup technologies that better responds to demands placed by the business. Increased business agility generates increased revenue.
  2. Richer application interfaces improving performance, end user productivity and satisfaction. This relates to increased use of software.
  3. User contributions that contributes towards the 'wisdom of the crowd'
  4. Assemble flexible applications faster
  5. Ability to share single infrastructure that leverages scale, promotes heavy collaboration and learning from collective experience.

 

The Future - Web 3.0..

'A new form of Web content that is meaningful to computers will unleash a revolution of new possibilities' - Tim Berners-Lee, James Hendler and Ora Lassila4

In keeping with the naming convention established with Web 2.0, then what holds for Web 3.0?

The third generation of the Web, enabled by the convergence of several key emerging technology trends that includes semantic Web, is about to emerge.

Semantic Web refers to the Web with the ability for reasoning. For this, semantic data will consist of “meta-data” that computers and humans are able to make sense of. The markup language known as the Resource Description Framework language (RDF) will be used to indicate not just how things should be rendered, but also as a means to express content. This can be looked as the most important step towards what Nova Spivak calls the 'Web is the Database'.

Here's a killer application in developement, that applies the concepts described in semantic Web technology: True Knowledge, a Cambridge based Internet search company has created what a search engine of the next generation may look like - one that can really find the needle in the haystack that uses the power of Web semantics to compensate for the weaknesses of the existing Web technologies!

In short, with Web 3.0, a massive software upgrade for the entire Web in terms of making it more intelligent awaits..

 

Summary

Web 2.0 is considered a perceived next-generation of the Web that promotes creativity and collaboration among users in building engaging, useful software on the Web with rich user interfaces. In essence, the Web is shifting from an international library of interlinked pages to an information ecosystem, where data circulates like nutrients in a rain forest. At the dawn of the sea change from the Web of documents to a Web of data, awaits - all things great technological revolutions are made of.

 

References:

  1. What the Bubble Got Right - Paul Graham
  2. Minding The Planet - The Meaning and Future of the Semantic Web
  3. Service Oriented Architecture - an Overview
  4. The Semantic Web - By Tim Berners-Lee, James Hendler and Ora Lassila

 

Resources:

  1. Introduction to the Semantic Web
  2. True Knowledge
  3. Tim Berners Lee on the Semantic Web
  4. WSO2 Mashup Server

 

Author:

Ayanthi Anandagoda is a Senior Content Specialist at WSO2. ayanthi at wso2 dot com.