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Web 2.0 Principles and Lessons

Category:  Orientation > Wireless 101 > Food For Thought

From Web 1.0 to Web 2.0 means ...
From DoubleClick to Google AdSense
From Ofoto to Flickr
From Akamai to BitTorrent
From mp3.com to Napster
From Britannica Online to Wikipedia
From personal websites to blogging
From evite to upcoming.org and EVDB
From domain name speculation to search engine optimization
From page views to cost per click
From screen scraping to web services
From publishing to participation
From content management systems to wikis
From directories (taxonomy) to tagging ("folksonomy")
From stickiness to syndication What Is Web 2.0

In this other "must read" article on advances on the Web (see my previous post The Web is Evolving, and so is its Supporting Cast), Tim O'Reilly explains the origins of the term Web 2.0 and lays out the underlying principles that led he and his colleagues to come up with this terminology and the lessons learned from taking this Web 2.0 perspective.

1. The Web is a platform where the value of the software is proportional to the scale and dynamism of the data it helps to manage, i.e., build bridges to more data, not fences around your data (e.g., Google). Leverage customer-self service and algorithmic data management to reach out to the entire web, to the edges and not just the center, to the long tail and not just the head (e.g., Overture and AdSense). The service automatically gets better the more people use it (e.g., BitTorrent).

2. Embrace the power of the web to harness collective intelligence, so that network effects from user contributions are the key to market dominance (e.g., Wikpedia). Blogs are the best example of this principle. ... like Wikipedia, blogging harnesses collective intelligence as a kind of filter. What James Suriowecki calls "the wisdom of crowds" comes into play, and much as PageRank produces better results than analysis of any individual document, the collective attention of the blogosphere selects for value.

3. Data is the next Intel Inside, as data become the building blocks for Web 2.0 applications (e.g., GoogleMaps). O'Reilly envisions a coming battle over control as data owners line up against applications that seek to leverage that data.

4. End of the Software Release Cycle. When software is viewed as a service rather than a product, operations that ensure service quality become a core competency, users become co-developers, and development moves from an episodic activity characterized by releases, to a constant activity marked by fluid updates.

5. Lightweight programming models drive several shifts, lightweight programming models that allow for loosely coupled systems, a preference for syndication over coordination, and designs that anticipate being hacked and mixed on the back end (designers start the process and let the hordes of smart programers leverage their creativity to continue the process beyond the original vision, in new - and unpredictable - directions).

6. Software Above the Level of a Single Device is a paradigm shift required by web-based businesses, where the web and web services pull together resources to provide a service not possible without a network paradigm. iTunes and TiVo are examples of services that manage data as a service and leverage network dynamics.

7. Rich User Experiences. As new applications are written with the Web as a platform, the creators can leverage not only the new capabilities that network dynamics make available, but also the best of the old PC-based applications, which results in a delightful, new, rich user experience. This transistion provides new companies with a great opportunity, and incumbents with an ongoing challenge.

I'll close this post by emphasizing the dynamic nature of the changes we are in the middle of, and the need for a robust broadband data infrastructure to complement such Web evolution. If you'd like to see my opinions in more detail, take a look at my whitepaper from this spring, UnwireMyCity On Structural Change. For his part, O'Neill concludes with this set of core competencies for any outfit that purports to be a "Web 2.0 Company."

Let's close, therefore, by summarizing what we believe to be the core competencies of Web 2.0 companies:

The next time a company claims that it's "Web 2.0," test their features against the list above. The more points they score, the more they are worthy of the name. Remember, though, that excellence in one area may be more telling than some small steps in all seven.

Posted on December 15, 2005 at 12:56 PM

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