The Web 2.0 Hype - Exactly What is It?

So, you have probably heard the term by now. What exactly is Web 2.0, though? Today we are here to find out.

The 2.0 stands for the 2nd generation of website development and design. The main characteristics of this new generation in web development are geared toward ease of sharing info, design centered around the web surfer, collaborating the www (world wide web) and communication. A good way to simplify it's meaning is by describing it as "The Participatory Web". Many of these concepts have already given rise to wikis, blogs, social networking sites (such as twitter) and video sharing sites.

Rather than using the static websites of Web 1.0 websurfers are now interacting fully during their web-surfing sessions. Software is actually being run by means of a web browser. An example of how this software works is by allowing users to actually participate in the web session by sending information across the internet which adds to the website itself.

There are many characteristics that cause a Web 2.0 site to stand out like a sore thumb. Search is one of these characteristics that is very common nowadays. Anymore, you are hard pressed to find a website without a search option. Links to guides, which contains relevant info, are also very common.

Authoring is another Web 2.0 characteristic that has taken off in recent years. A great example of this is wikipedia.org where users contribute 100% of the content available on the website.

Tags are very new but taking off like a formula one race car. The definition of Tag is a one word description, chosen by the user, that describes the content in an effort to avoid categories and help to make searching easier. Signals (RSS feeds) are also a sure sign of a Web 2.0 site. RSS feeds are used to instantly notify web surfers of new or changed content. It is normally just a title and small excerpt of the text with an option to link to the full document.

Some of the most fascinating and useful Web 2.0 projects are programs that actually run right inside your web browser. There are a great many of these available and they range from word processing applications to entire operating systems (actually more of a platform for applications). There were a large amount of these applications available from 1997 to 2001 but a lot of them disappeared shortly thereafter because of the dot-com bubble.

Many people believe that Web 2.0 is not really a new version of the www. They claim that it is simply extending what Web 1.0 had to offer. The basis for this argument is that AJAX did not replace HTTP at all. It simply runs underneath the HTTP framework.

Whatever you want to call it now you know what all this hype about Web 2.0 entails. The internet will always change rapidly so stay up to date on your terms and avoid being caught in the dust.