Since 2004, when the phrase was first coined, Web 2.0 has been the buzz word of the entire internet community. We’ve heard how it will make the internet better, faster and more collaborative than we ever thought possible. But what is Web 2.0 exactly? If you ask 10 different online professionals you’ll probably get 10 different answers. The reason why is that Web 2.0 is still a developing idea--a mixture of many ideas and interactions for where the internet is moving. In this blog, I want to give an overview of this transition process and look at the progress of Web 2.0 over the past few years.

To understand where the web is going, we first need to understand where the web has been. Back in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, the web was mainly used as an information gathering tool. This web, Web 1.0, was accessed through dial-up modems with 50k bandwidths. Websites were static advertisements for themselves, rarely updating their content and functioning very similar to the billboards we drive by every day. Essentially the traditional approach to print marketing and advertising was applied to the web in a “top-down” approach.

 
Users were going to websites to consume content rather than being an active participant in creating it. What user controlled sites there were manifested as “personal” sites, where <blink> and <marquee> tags were the norm (Remember Angelfire? Geocities? Don’t deny having one. We know you’re lying). This was the “Old Web” and nearly every site created during this time period was entrenched in it.

Web 1.0 was about:

• reading
• corporate sites
• dialup
• top-down
• home pages
• structure and labels
• being edited and produced
• banner ads

With the advent of Web 2.0, the web was completely flipped upside down. The transition began as a result of technological improvements in connection speeds (broadband) and web browsers. It was further pushed on by the wider use of Flash applications and the invention of Ajax. Within the past few years, applications like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube have revolutionized how people experience the web. Websites are no longer static for months at a time but constantly shifting based on what users want. (Sites like Digg.com create their content completely based on user input and what is important to them.) Personal sites have been replaced by Facebook profiles and Twitter accounts that allow users to connect with people from around the world in real time. Instead of the top-down approach of the old web, content today grows organically from everyday users, posting on message boards and blogging from home. Users like you and I have become the chief content writers on the web. Web 2.0 has moved the internet from only an information-gathering tool to an interactive community experience that we control.

 

This movement is not done yet. As I wrote earlier, Web 2.0 is still a developing idea. While many large corporations have taken hold and used the new web to their advantage, we are just now seeing the mid-sized and smaller companies take steps to bridge the gap. And as new technologies continue to develop the web experience and integrate it even further into our daily lives, there will be a growing demand from these smaller businesses to get in the 2.0 game. 

Web 2.0 is about:

• collaborative writing
• blogs
• sharing ideas and content
  
• web applications
• broadband
• communities
• bottom-up