web technologies

Web 3.0

Web 3.0 is defined as the creation of high-quality
content and services produced by gifted individuals using Web 2.0 technology
as an enabling platform.

Web 2.0 services are now the commoditized platform, not the final product. In
a world where a social network, wiki, or social bookmarking service can be built
for free and in an instant, what's next?

Web 2.0 services like digg and YouTube evolve into Web 3.0 services with an
additional layer of individual excellence and focus. As an example, funnyordie.com
leverages all the standard YouTube Web 2.0 feature sets like syndication and
social networking, while adding a layer of talent and trust to them.

A version of digg where experts check the validity of claims, corrected errors,
and restated headlines to be more accurate would be the Web 3.0 version. However,
I'm not sure if the digg community will embrace that any time soon.

Wikipedia, considered a Web 1.5 service, is experiencing the start of the Web
3.0 movement by locking pages down as they reach completion, and (at least in
their German version) requiring edits to flow through trusted experts.

Also of note, is what Web 3.0 leaves behind. Web 3.0 throttles the "wisdom
of the crowds" from turning into the "madness of the mobs" we've
seen all to often, by balancing it with a respect of experts. Web 3.0 leaves
behind the cowardly anonymous contributors and the selfish blackhat SEOs that
have polluted and diminished so many communities.

Web 3.0 is a return to what was great about media and technology before Web
2.0: recognizing talent and expertise, the ownership of ones words, and fairness.
It's time to evolve, shall we?

This section provides information about web technologies
that relate to the interface between web servers and their clients. This information
includes markup languages, programming interfaces and languages, and standards
for document identification and display.

Section Organization

Markup Languages Section - Includes all markup languages including HTML, XML,
and SGML. Documentation in this section currently includes an HTML Guide, XML
Guide, and a Document Type Definition (DTD) reading reference.

CGI Section- Includes four documents describing implementation of the client
to server web interface. It includes information about the common gateway interface
(CGI), server side includes (SSI), JavaScript, and writing perl script programs


HTTP Section - Thic section currently includes an HTTP Reference which is based
on RFC 2616. It has brief descriptions of the HTTP request and response headers
and also lists the possible response headers such as 404 (not found).

PHP - PHP is a scripting language that runs on the web server and the script
code is embedded in the HTML document. It is easy to use with syntax similar
to C which is why it is so popular. This section includes a PHP Introduction
manual.

JAVA Section - Documentation is being generated for this section. It currently
contains some web links.

MIME Section - This section describes Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension along
with its purpose and it also includes a few MIME related web links.

Graphics - Gif files used to add graphics to web pages.

Technologies to be included in this section

Streaming audio and video

World Wide Web Coordinating Groups

There are many types of technologies which are used to support the world wide
web and more are being developed all the time. There are several groups involved
in the development and coordination of these technologies.

IAB - Internet Architecture Board. Web site: IAB.
The IAB websites states that "The IAB does not aim to produce polished
technical proposals on such topics. Rather, the intention is to stimulate action
by the IESG or within the IETF community that will lead to proposals that meet
general consensus."

IANA - Internet Assigned Numbers Authority. Web site: IANA. They control the
assignment of internet addresses and domain names.

IESG - The Internet Engineering Steering Group. Web site: IESG. According to
RFC 2418, the IESG "has responsibility for developing and reviewing specifications
intended as Internet Standards."

IETF - The Internet Engineering Task Force. Web site: IETF. Their web site says
"The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is a large open international
community of network designers, operators, vendors, and researchers concerned
with the evolution of the Internet architecture and the smooth operation of
the Internet."

InterNIC - Internet Network Information Center, the authority for allocating
internet addresses. Web site: InterNIC.

IRTF - Internet Research Task Force. Web site: IRTF. Their web site states their
mission is "To promote research of importance to the evolution of the future
Internet by creating focused, long-term and small Research Groups working on
topics related to Internet protocols, applications, architecture and technology."


ISOC - Internet Society, promotes internet policies. Web site: ISOC.

ISTF - Internet Societal Task Force. Web site: ISTF. Their mission is "To
assure the open development, evolution and use of the Internet for the benefit
of all people throughout the world".

W3C - World Wide Web Consortium, sets standards for the web working with the
IETF. W3C

OASIS - Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards.
OASIS

Internet2 Internet2 An Organization that supports internet related technologies
including XML, DHTML, JAVA and more.

IRT - Internet Related Technologies. Internet Related TechnologiesTheir website
states "Internet2, led by over 180 U.S. universities working in partnership
with industry and government, is developing and deploying advanced network applications
and technologies, accelerating the creation of tomorrow's Internet."

Graphic Communications Association A trade association that provides standards
for the printing and publishing industries.

 

The Open Source Definition



Introduction

Open source doesn't just mean access to the source code. The distribution terms
of open-source software must comply with the following criteria:

1. Free Redistribution

The license shall not restrict any party from selling or giving away the software
as a component of an aggregate software distribution containing programs from
several different sources. The license shall not require a royalty or other
fee for such sale.

2. Source Code

The program must include source code, and must allow distribution in source
code as well as compiled form. Where some form of a product is not distributed
with source code, there must be a well-publicized means of obtaining the source
code for no more than a reasonable reproduction cost preferably, downloading
via the Internet without charge. The source code must be the preferred form
in which a programmer would modify the program. Deliberately obfuscated source
code is not allowed. Intermediate forms such as the output of a preprocessor
or translator are not allowed.

3. Derived Works

The license must allow modifications and derived works, and must allow them
to be distributed under the same terms as the license of the original software.

4. Integrity of The Author's Source Code

The license may restrict source-code from being distributed in modified form
only if the license allows the distribution of "patch files" with
the source code for the purpose of modifying the program at build time. The
license must explicitly permit distribution of software built from modified
source code. The license may require derived works to carry a different name
or version number from the original software.

5. No Discrimination Against Persons or Groups

The license must not discriminate against any person or group of persons.

6. No Discrimination Against Fields of Endeavor

The license must not restrict anyone from making use of the program in a specific
field of endeavor. For example, it may not restrict the program from being used
in a business, or from being used for genetic research.

7. Distribution of License

The rights attached to the program must apply to all to whom the program is
redistributed without the need for execution of an additional license by those
parties.

8. License Must Not Be Specific to a Product

The rights attached to the program must not depend on the program's being part
of a particular software distribution. If the program is extracted from that
distribution and used or distributed within the terms of the program's license,
all parties to whom the program is redistributed should have the same rights
as those that are granted in conjunction with the original software distribution.

9. License Must Not Restrict Other Software

The license must not place restrictions on other software that is distributed
along with the licensed software. For example, the license must not insist that
all other programs distributed on the same medium must be open-source software.

10. License Must Be Technology-Neutral

No provision of the license may be predicated on any individual technology or
style of interface.

 

I have to thank kiwi journalist Mark Evans for the inspiration
for this series. Mark recently had an article published in Management Magazine
that outlined Web trends for 2006 and 2007. Mark interviewed me for that article
and so this post (and the next) will utilize much of the thinking I did to contribute
to Mark's article. Here goes...

2006 Review

- Undoubtedly 2006 has been the year of the social network. MySpace, YouTube,
Facebook have been the three outstanding success stories - but also impressive
was Bebo (in the UK particularly) and there was strong growth in existing web
2.0 networks like Flickr and del.icio.us. The zenith of this social networking
craze was probably Google buying YouTube for $1.65 B.

- RSS continues to inch towards the mainstream - Yahoo
integrated it into Y! Mail Beta, Microsoft is utilizing it more (e.g. integrated
into IE7), Google came out with Google Base and the GData format (which is based
on the RSS variant, ATOM). While 2006 can't be seen as the breakthrough year
for RSS in the mainstream, we will probably see RSS bloom in 2007 as a result
of the groundwork done in '06 by the big Internet companies. Note that there
have been recent murmurs that Yahoo is scaling back RSS, but I think this is
a short-term trend only.

- 2006 was also the year that Web 2.0 got overhyped and
the term is now generally accepted as just a marketing term, akin to Dot Com.
But whatever you call it - I prefer to use the term 'Social Web' or even 'read/write
Web' nowadays - this current era of the Web is making a big impact. Mainstream
media is taking on board many read/write philosophies. This is evidenced in
many ways - e.g. News Corp acquiring MySpace and seeing enormous growth; blogs
are now accepted by mainstream media and businesses; etc. Also the overwhelming
presence of media people at the 2006 Web 2.0 Summit was evidence that Social
Web trends are influencing a broader cross-spectrum of people now.

- In 2006 Amazon came out with some startling new web
technologies - Mechanical Turk, S3 (online storage) and EC2. Their push to be
a major web services infrastructure platform was one of the more intriguing
strategies from an Internet bigco this year.

- On the other big companies... Google dominated the
news and buzz this year, Microsoft pushed ahead with its Windows Live strategy
(its Web-based suite of products and services), and Yahoo had a steady product
year (but ending with organizational issues). Apple continued to dominate the
online music market (forcing Microsoft to compete head-on) and has also entered
the video space with gusto.

- Lots of bigco partnering. Allow me to quote directly
from Mark Evans here, as he captured this trend very nicely: "Ebay and
Yahoo have snuggled up together, announcing in May that Yahoo would serve display
ads to Ebay’s US users and promote Paypal – Ebay’s payment
service – to Yahoo users. In August, Ebay signed Google to serve ads to
international Ebay users. A dollar each way, perhaps?"

- 2006 also saw the return of the VC money (see web 2.0
hype above!). Although VC money this time round seems to be much more circumspect
and generally lower valuations than in the dot com boom. Indeed an associated
trend is that web startups are increasingly going it alone and bootstrapping,
thanks to open source technologies (e.g. the LAMP platform) and ability to work
anywhere anytime. On the flip side (pardon the pun), it still pays to be located
in Silicon Valley - as that is where the key networking and fundraising activity
still takes place.

- Localization really matters in Web space - for example
TradeMe dominates New Zealand traffic and similar local products often outrank
the likes of Yahoo and Google in their local markets. The larger trend here
is that cultural and language differences mean that big US companies don't always
dominate in international markets. Having said that, there is also a lot of
overseas cloning of successful Silicon Valley apps (e.g. digg, flickr). See
Read/WriteWeb's continuing coverage of international markets for individual
country drill-downs.

- The consumerization of the enterprise has been an emerging
trend all year. More and more social web apps are coming into the enterprise
(e.g. Skype, IM), and organizations are adopting read/write Web philosophies.
Corporate blogging got popular in 2006 and blogs are usually part of the mix
now in marketing plans.

- In particular, I've been tracking the trend of Web
Office. As well as lots of startup action (Zoho, Zimbra, ThinkFree, et al),
late this year saw a flurry of action from Google in this space - Google Apps
For Your Domain, the acquisitions of Writely and JotSpot, the launch of Google
Docs & Spreadsheets, and more. In 2007 a major area of focus will be the
increasing competition in office software between Google and Microsoft.

- Widgets (mini web apps) were all the rage this year,
culminating in its own conference. Related to this, 'personalized start pages'
(live.com, netvibes, pageflakes, etc) ramped up, enabling users to collect their
widgets together on the one site.

- Online video was hot, hot, hot this year! There are
currently a host of YouTube wannabes on the market. The best chance for success
for all these startups vying for attention, is to either come out with a next-generation
product that takes online video functionality to the next level and/or target
a specific niche market.

- VoIP space showed signs of hotting up. Skype now has
a bunch of new competitors, all aiming to disrupt the existing telecoms industry.

- Hybrid web/desktop apps (or as Read/WriteWeb termed
it "webified desktop apps") came into play a lot more this year. For
example the Times Reader, built using Microsoft WPF technology. Also noteworthy
is Adobe's Apollo platform and Laszlo's rich internet apps platform.

- Browser Wars 2.0. Firefox enjoyed strong growth this
year and released its 2.0 browser in October. 2006 was also (not coincidentally)
the year that Microsoft finally upgraded its Internet Explorer browser, to 7.0.

- From a blog perspective, Techcrunch established itself
as the blog at the center of all the web 2.0 action - attracting aspiring startups
like moths around a flame. Other tech blogs like Gigaom, VentureBeat and Read/WriteWeb
itself, have also experienced excellent growth this year.

- Ajax had strong growth this year and according to some
reports is not that far behind Flash now.

- World Internet Penetration is 16% and growing - Asia
in particular is ramping up fast! Also noteworthy is that 3/4 of traffic to
top websites is international.

Those were the major trends from the Web this year, but
there are many other smaller trends. Here is a starter for 10:

RSS filtering, while not as strong as I expected this
year, is still making progress via very small startups. The new Google Reader
also had some interesting filtering features. However PubSub carked it.

The commodization of RSS Readers - e.g. the Pluck Reader shut down.

P2P traffic continued to grow.

The WebOS (virtual desktop) was a relatively small market this year, but a lot
of startups entered the space.

Digital Reading market hotted up - Microsoft, Sony and Adobe all released new
e-reading products.

Asian Mobile Web years ahead - while the Mobile Web has a long way to go in
places like the US and NZ, in Asia the mobile Web had continued growth in 2006.


e-learning had strong growth in 2006.

There was hot competition between blog vendors - e.g. SixApart vs Wordpress


Innovative distributed portal plays are growing fast - e.g. edgeio, simplyhired.


ADD MORE IN THE COMMENTS...

As the final bullet point implies, so much more has happened in 2006 than I
can hope to cover in one post. So please add other 2006 Web trends to the comments.
After all, the only way this list is going to be comprehensive is via the Power
of the Many ;-)

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