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Why Web 2.0 makes sense

Fred Oliveira on December 22, 2005

Lately there’s been some discussion about whether or not to use the term “Web 2.0″ in the future. Was it all just a fad? Are we cheating people and marketing fake concepts? Russel Shaw over at ZDNet boldly says it doesn’t exist. Richard McManus says it’s the nail in the coffin and calls quits on using the term. Winer says “Busted!“. Mike keeps the Web 2.0 flag way up and in a friendly move calls everybody a bastard in his SouthPark impression.

But enough of others, here’s what Web 2.0 means to me. Web 2.0 encompasses many of the technological changes we’re seeing happen. It means a new way to look at web applications, services and (more importantly in my case), user experience. Web 2.0 puts the user in the center of the action and activity.

So why Web 2.0? Is this a new version of anything? Well no, but if you called it “new web” people wouldn’t care. If it hadn’t become a movement, many of the services emerging now would have never existed. If it didn’t have support from the right people, it wouldn’t be, effectively, changing the face of the web.

Does it make sense to keep the term going? As long as we’re still working towards a user-centered web, better uses for data, more service integration and more simplicity, yes. And I’ll keep using it. I know many others will too.


Comments on this post

Michael McCorry

If it hadn’t become a movement, many of the services emerging now would have never existed.

I disagree. It only took a small handful of prominent services to use currently existing technology to make user experience better. This inspired others to make some wonderful things, true, but it was then, as the patterns formed, that someone decided to give it a label, Web 2.0. Yay, now everyone has a new buzzword to put on their resumes.

Chris Peters

If you put the term “Web 2.0″ on your resume, then God help you. :)

Fred

Lets just not go to that extreme ;)

web2.wsj2.com

Where are we with Web 2.0?

Web 2.0 has become a polarizing yet strangely magnetic topic du jour. It’s a subject a great many people love to grouse about, even as they spend way too much time thinking about it, all the while hating it, loving it, or just trying to figure

Easton Ellsworth

Because “Web 2.0″ is such a broad, nebulous term, I don’t like using it all that much … but alas, I still do, because I like sounding Web-savvy. (C’mon, you know you do it, too.) Was I the only one who was really confused for a while after first hearing the term? And I’m still not sure that I understand all that it encompasses. Wikis, everything-casting, mashups of all shapes and sizes, collaborative communication, yadda yadda … all very head-spinning and exciting, yet confusingly amorphous when seen as a “Web 2.0″ whole.

James Cole

So-called web 2.0 applications are not different enough from what has come before to warrent a new version. I use portals, ajax’d websites, tags and so on and I love it, but I use Amazon, Google, BBC news, Slashdot, forums and webmail much more.

‘Web 2.0′ stuff is cool and useful, but none of it is revolutionary and certainly none of it makes us much more productive or social or happier. Compared to the inception of distributed computing, this is all pretty trivial stuff and even if some of these things are really kick-arse, they are still the first infant steps of the Internet and re-versioning the whole thing is a bit pre-emptive.

hash

The term Web 2.0 has it’s uses though, especially within the corporate environment when trying to explain what has happened and what changes have been occuring. Yes, it’s a buzz word, but it at least identifies something that we’ve all seen - a change in the way our technology is being presented and used.

InfoTangle :: The Hype and the Hullabaloo of Web 2.0 :: January :: 2006

[...] Oliveira, Frederico. “Why Web 2.0 Makes Sense”. WeBreakStuff, 12/22/05. http://blog.webreakstuff.com/?p=162 Viewed 1/9/06. [...]

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