What is Web 2.0?

Posted by Miles Evans

When Web 2.0 style applications began appearing in early 2005 there really wasn’t a great deal of developers taking advantage of the new design platform aside from Google, del.icio.us, wikipedia, and a handful of others. Now in early 2006 we have the almost overwhelming spawn of dozens of new Web 2.0 websites appearing every month – And the buzz is growing. Obviously there is a huge amount of hype around Web 2.0 but behind that lies some insightful design principles and a great deal of potential.

Perhaps the best possible quote I can provide to sum up Web 2.0 services is from Tim O'Reilly:

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.

I think Tim needs no introduction. What is Web 2.0 - Design Patterns and Business Models for the Next Generation of Software by Tim O'Reilly is a very lengthy discussion about what exactly Web 2.0 is with some great examples of the core technologies involved. Although a few months old this essay remains one of the most thorough and relevant – especially for developers.

On the blogging front, the Web 2.0 Workgroup is a very large list of blogs and feeds of the movers and shakers of Web 2.0. Plenty of dev people here as well.

Need examples? Kat Ortland over at seomoz has recently put together likely the best list of 2.0 powered companies I have seen on her Web 2.0 Awards page.

Possibly the best website online for profiling and reviewing new Web 2.0 projects is techcrunch by Michael Arrington. This is a must feed.

I am sure I am missing some essential resources for research and ideas on this topic so please comment away if you know of any.

As a side note a close dev friend of mine has been working very hard on a killer suite of Web 2.0 powered apps for mass release before summer. They will focus on SEO and SEM based research. I have seen them and they are extremely impressive, but I have been sworn to secrecy on mentioning specific features. More on that soonish.

Posted Apr 06, 2006 at 04:15 AM | Permalink | Trackback URL | Del.icio.us | DIGG!