I think I first read a reference to web 2.0 in one of the blogs I subscribed to in Bloglines. According to the article on "Web 2.0" in Wikipedia, the phrase web 2.0, which was "coined by O'Reilly Media in 2004, refers to a perceived or proposed second generation of Internet-based services—such as social networking sites, wikis, communication tools, and folksonomies—that emphasize online collaboration and sharing among users."
About a month ago in a blog entry on O'Reilly Radar, Tim O'Reilly offered a definition of web 2.0:
Web 2.0 is the business revolution in the computer industry caused by the move to the internet as platform, and an attempt to understand the rules for success on that new platform. Chief among those rules is this: Build applications that harness network effects to get better the more people use them. (This is what I've elsewhere called "harnessing collective intelligence.")
In an article posted in September of 2005, "What Is Web 2.0: Design Patterns and Business Models for the Next Generation of Software," O'Reilly tried to explain what is meant by web 2.0. In this article, he explored seven principles:
- The Web As Platform
- Harnessing Collective Intelligence
- Data is the Next Intel Inside
- End of the Software Release Cycle
- Lightweight Programming Models
- Software Above the Level of a Single Device
- Rich User Experiences
I'm still not sure I understand all of the technical terminology, but I'm interested in learning more. The issue of Intercom I received last week is about web 2.0 and writing.
Apparently, there's also web 3.0.
