Background Reading
Web 2.0 Primer
The rules for running a website are changing. In particular, we are seeing much more content created by users during the browsing experience. Most of today's websites are still built using Web 1.0 or Web 1.5 technology, and focus on publishing. In Web 2.0, the attention shifts towards participation. Examples of Web 2.0 Successes to date show us that although the information may be "messier", users are embracing it. For further reading, O'Reilly's article on Web 2.0 is superb.
Web 1.0
A decade ago, when the Web first became popular, static HTML was a key technology that allowed the publishing of content in such a way that many people could easily access it. The technical know-how necessary to create such "pages" was sufficiently light, and the knowledge needed to "browse" such pages trivial enough that the World Wide Web exploded. In this "hub and spoke" model, publishers are hubs and browser users are spokes.
During this time, known sometimes as "Web 1.0", HTML web pages are generally fashioned by hand or by a tool such as Mircosoft FrontPage or Macromedia Dreamweaver. The content of individually crafted pages is generally intregrated tightly with the format of the page, and thus editing a site is can be laborious and editing someone else's site can be very difficult. Page linking is also integral to a site's design, and hence it it important to make sure that changes don't "break" the site. Changes are generally completed offline, and prior to pushing a site out to the world, a certain level of quality testing is necessary. The larger the site, the more difficult this process is to manage.
Web 1.5
Over time, content management systems were put in place, which served dynamic HTML pages created on the fly, based on information in a content database. This has been called Web 1.5 and has the advantage of being signficantly more scaleable than Web 1.0. This approach relies upon central management of information and as in Web 1.0, and continues to follow a "hub and spoke" model, where information is published by few and read by many.
Web 2.0
Recently, new models for the Web have emerged which allow content to be created at the "fringe" (spokes) and not at the "hub" or center. This concept is sometimes referred to as "Social Networking" or Web 2.0. Flickr is an example; allowing users to upload pictures, tag and share them easily. The pictures are the content and anyone can go to Flickr and request pictures of the "Eiffel Tower".
In Web 2.0, content is separated from format and hence as with the example of Flickr, users uploading photo's don't need to think about the presentation in which those pictures will latter appear. The threshold necessary to get content in place is much lower than in Web 1.0; users need not be familiar with HTML, FTP, Web Design software, Web hosting or domain names. Because content is separated from the design of the website, two advantages are realized: first, the look and feel of the site may be changed more easily and secondly the site becomes highly scaleable.
Weblogs (or blogs) are also an example of this structure. Content is generally created simply by posting text and uploading pictures to the blog and the appearance of the blog can be modified at any time by changing the "skin". There is generally a single "owner" of the blog, who makes primary posts, and then anyone is generally invited to comment on the posts. Blog owners may elect to allow open commenting, or moderate the comments before allowing publication.
Wiki's are also an example of this structure, and to an even higher degree. A wiki is a site that allows all visitors to create and edit the content housed therein. So while a blog invites commentary by it's readers, a wiki inherently creates an architecture for participation.
What is a Wiki?
A key aspect of Web 2.0 is the idea that many people working together can create something that would otherwise be impossible to create by one person or a few. This Architecture of Collaboration is best exhibited in the growing trend towards fully editable websites, or wikis. The idea of a wiki was first invented by Ward Cunningham in 1995 and was embodied in his WikiWikiWeb. Ward is open to new ways of thinking that most people would never consider. The key concepts he embraced which allowed wiki to happen are:
- Trust - there are more good people than bad
- Volunteerism - if you have a project that is worth working on, people will volunteer
- Automagical - links that go nowhere are not "broken" they are "invitations" to create needed articles
- Change is cheap - over time Mistakes will be corrected and the result will move in a positive direction
Of course there are bad actors and malicious edits are problem for all wikis large and small. There is a war against vandalism and as one would expect, the wiki community is working together to come up with better solutions to keep the vandals in check.
In spite of vandalism, wikis are becoming increasingly popular and today there are several types of wikis in use.
- Wikis in the news
- The Wikipedia Phenomenon
