Introduction

Web development is a broad term for the work involved in developing a web site for the Internet
(World Wide Web) or an intranet (a private network). This can include web design, web content
development, client liaison, client-side/server-side scripting, web server and network
security configuration, and e-commerce development. However, among web professionals, "web
development" usually refers to the main non-design aspects of building web sites:
writing markup and coding. Web development can range from developing the simplest static
single page of plain text to the most complex web-based internet applications, electronic
businesses, or social network services.

For larger organizations and businesses, web development teams can consist of hundreds of
people (web developers). Smaller organizations may only require a single permanent or
contracting webmaster, or secondary assignment to related job positions such as a graphic
designer and/or information systems technician. Web development may be a collaborative effort
between departments rather than the domain of a designated department.

Web development as an industry

Since the mid-1990s, web development has been one of the fastest growing industries in the
world. In 1995 there were fewer than 1,000 web development companies in the United States,
but by 2005 there were over 30,000 such companies in the U.S. alone.[1][dubious – discuss] The growth
of this industry is being pushed by large businesses wishing to sell products and services to their
customers and to automate business workflow.

In addition, cost of Web site development and hosting has dropped dramatically during this time.
Instead of costing tens of thousands of dollars, as was the case for early websites, one can now
develop a simple web site for less than a thousand dollars, depending on the complexity and
amount of content.[citation needed] Smaller Web site development companies are now able to make
web design accessible to both smaller companies and individuals further fueling the growth of
the web development industry. As far as web development tools and platforms are concerned,
there are many systems available to the public free of charge to aid in development. A popular
example is the LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP), which is usually distributed free of
charge. This fact alone has manifested into many people around the globe setting up new Web
sites daily and thus contributing to increase in web development popularity. Another contributing
factor has been the rise of easy to use WYSIWYG web development software, most
prominently Adobe Dreamweaver, Netbeans, WebDev, or Microsoft Expression Studio, Adobe
Flex. Using such software, virtually anyone can develop a Web page in a matter of minutes.
Knowledge of HyperText Markup Language (HTML), or other programming languages is not
required, but recommended for professional results.

The next generation of web development tools uses the strong growth in LAMP, Java Platform,
Enterprise Edition technologies and Microsoft .NET technologies to provide the Web as a way to
run applications online. Web developers now help to deliver applications as Web services which
were traditionally only available as applications on a desk based computer.

Instead of running executable code on a local computer, users are interacting with online
applications to create new content. This has created new methods in communication and allowed
for many opportunities to decentralize information and media distribution. Users are now able to
interact with applications from many locations, instead of being tied to a specific workstation for
their application environment.

Examples of dramatic transformation in communication and commerce led by web development

include e-commerce. Online auction sites such as eBay have changed the way consumers
consume and purchase goods and services. Online resellers such
as Amazon.com and Buy.com (among many, many others) have transformed the shopping and
bargain hunting experience for many consumers. Another good example of transformative
communication led by web development is the blog. Web applications such
as WordPress and Movable Type have created easily implemented blog environments for
individual Web sites. Open source content management systems such
as Joomla!, Drupal, XOOPS, and TYPO3 andenterprise content management systems such
as Alfresco have extended web development into new modes of interaction and communication.

In addition, web development has moved to a new phase of Internet communication. Computer
web sites are no longer simply tools for work or commerce but used most for communication.
Websites such as Facebook and Twitter provide users a platform to freely communicate. This
new form of web communication is also changing e-commerce through the number of hits and
online advertisement.
Typical Areas

Web Development can be split into many areas and a typical and basic web development
hierarchy might consist of:
[edit]Client Side Coding

 Ajax Provides new methods of using JavaScript, and other languages to improve the user
experience.
 Flash Adobe Flash Player is a ubiquitous client-side platform ready for RIAs. Flex 2 is
also deployed to the Flash Player (version 9+).
 JavaScript Formally called ECMAScript, JavaScript is a ubiquitous client side platform
for creating and delivering rich Web applications that can also run across a wide variety of
devices.
 Microsoft Silverlight Microsoft's browser plugin that enables animation, vector graphics
and high-definition video playback, programmed using XAML and .NET programming
languages.
 HTML5 and CSS3 Latest HTML proposed standard combined with the latest proposed
standard for CSS natively supports much of the client-side functionality provided by other
frameworks such as Flash and Silverlight

Server Side Coding

 ASP (Microsoft proprietary)

 ColdFusion (Adobe proprietary, formerly Macromedia)
 CGI and/or Perl (open source)
 Groovy (programming language) Grails (framework)
 Java, e.g. Java EE or WebObjects
 Lotus Domino
 PHP (open source)
 Python, e.g. Django (web framework) (open source)
 Ruby, e.g. Ruby on Rails (open source)
 Smalltalk e.g. Seaside, AIDA/Web
 SSJS Server-Side JavaScript, e.g. Aptana Jaxer, Mozilla Rhino
 Websphere (IBM proprietary)
 .NET (Microsoft proprietary)
The World Wide Web has become a major delivery platform for web development a variety of
complex and sophisticated enterprise applications in several domains. In addition to their
inherent multifaceted functionality, these web applications exhibit complex behavior and place
some unique demands on their usability, performance, security and ability to grow and evolve.
However, a vast majority of these applications continue to be developed in an ad-hoc way,
contributing to problems of usability, maintainability, quality and reliability.(1)(2) While web
development can benefit from established practices from other related disciplines, it has certain
distinguishing characteristics that demand special considerations. In the recent years, web
development there have been some developments towards addressing these problems and
requirements. As an emerging discipline, web engineering actively promotes systematic,
disciplined and quantifiable approaches towards successful development of high-quality,
ubiquitously usable web-based systems and applications.(3)(4) In particular, web engineering
focuses on the methodologies, techniques and tools that are the foundation of web application
development and which support their design, development, evolution, and evaluation. Web
application development has certain characteristics that make it different from traditional
software, information system, or computer application development.

Web engineering is multidisciplinary and encompasses contributions from diverse areas: systems
analysis and design, software engineering, hypermedia/hypertext engineering, requirements
engineering, human-computer interaction, user interface, information engineering, information
indexing and retrieval, testing, modelling and simulation, project management, and graphic
design and presentation. Web engineering is neither a clone, nor a bcs subset of software
engineering, although both involve programming and software development. While web
Engineering uses software engineering principles, web development it encompasses new
approaches, methodologies, tools, techniques, and guidelines to meet the unique requirements of
web-based applications.
Client Side + Server Side

 Google Web Toolkit provides tools to create and maintain complex JavaScript front-end
applications in Java.
 Pyjamas is a tool and framework for developing Ajax applications and Rich Internet
Applications in python.
 Tersus is a platform for the development of rich web applications by visually defining
user interface, client side behavior and server side processing. (open source)

However lesser known languages like Ruby and Python are often paired with database servers
other than MySQL (the M in LAMP). Below are example of other databases currently in wide
use on the web. For instance some developers prefer a LAPR(Linux/Apache/PostgreSQL/Ruby
on Rails) setup for development.

Database Technology

 Apache Derby
 DB2 (IBM proprietary)
 Firebird
 Microsoft SQL Server
 MySQL
 Oracle
 PostgreSQL
 SQLite
 Sybase

In practice, many web developers will also have interdisciplinary skills / roles, including:

 Graphic design / web design

 Information architecture and copywriting/copyediting with
web usability, accessibility and search engine optimization in mind
 Project management, QA and other aspects common to IT development in general

The above list is a simple website development hierarchy and can be extended to include all
client side and server side aspects. It is still important to remember that web development is
generally split up into client side coding covering aspects such as the layout and design, then
server side coding, which covers the website's functionality and back end systems.

Looking at these items from an "umbrella approach", client side coding such as XHTML is
executed and stored on a local client (in a web browser) whereas server side code is not available
to a client and is executed on a web server which generates the appropriate XHTML which is
then sent to the client. As the nature of client side coding allows you to alter the HTML on a
local client and refresh the pages with updated content (locally), web designers must bear in
mind the importance and relevance to security with their server side scripts. If a server side script
accepts content from a locally modified client side script, the web development of that page
shows poor sanitization with relation to security.

Security Considerations

Web development takes into account many security considerations, such as data entry error
checking through forms, filtering output, and encryption.[2] Malicious practices such as SQL
injection can be executed by users with ill intent yet with only primitive knowledge of web
development as a whole. Not only this, but scripts can be exploited to grant unauthorized access
to malicious users trying to collect information such as email addresses, passwords and protected
content like credit card numbers.

Some of this is dependent on the server environment (most commonly Apache or Microsoft IIS)
on which bcs the scripting language, such as PHP, Ruby, Python, Perl or ASP is running, and
therefore is not necessarily down to the web developer themselves to maintain. However,
stringent testing of web applications before public release is encouraged to prevent such exploits
from occurring.

Keeping a web server safe from intrusion is often called Server Port Hardening. Many
technologies come into play when keeping information on the internet safe bcs when it is
transmitted from one location to another. For instance Secure Socket Layer Encryption (SSL)
Certificates are issued by certificate authorities to help prevent internet fraud. Many developers
often bcs employ different forms of encryption when transmitting and storing sensitive
information. A basic understanding of information technology security concerns is often part of a
web developer's knowledge.

Because new security holes are found in web applications even after testing and launch, security
patch updates are frequent for widely used applications. It is often the job of web developers to
keep applications up to date as security patches are released and new security concerns are
discovered.

Timeline
The term Web 2.0 is commonly associated with web applications that facilitate interactive information
sharing, interoperability, user-centered design,[1] andcollaboration on the World Wide Web. A Web 2.0 site
gives its users the free choice to interact or collaborate with each other in a social media dialogue as
creators (prosumers) of user-generated content in a virtual community, in contrast to websites where
users (consumers) are limited to the passive viewing ofcontent that was created for them. Examples of
Web 2.0 include social-networking sites, blogs, wikis, video-sharing sites, hosted services, web
applications, mashups and folksonomies.

The term is closely associated with Tim O'Reilly because of the O'Reilly Media Web 2.0 conference in
2004.[2][3] Although the term suggests a new version of the World Wide Web, it does not refer to an update
to any technical specifications, but rather to cumulative changes in the ways software developers andend-
users use the Web. Whether Web 2.0 is qualitatively different from prior web technologies has been
challenged by World Wide Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee, who called the term a "piece of jargon",
[4]
precisely because he intended the Web in his vision as "a collaborative medium, a place where we
[could] all meet and read and write". He called it the 'Read/Write Web'.[5]

Contents
[hide]

• 1 History

• 2 Characteristics

• 3 Technologies

• 4 Concepts

• 5 Usage

• 6 Web-based applications and

desktops

o 6.1 Internet

applications

• 7 Distribution of Media

o 7.1 XML and RSS

o 7.2 Web APIs

• 8 Criticism
 • 9 Trademark

• 10 Web 3.0

• 11 See also

• 12 References

• 13 External links

[edit]History

The term "Web 2.0" was coined in 1999 by Darcy DiNucci, a consultant on electronic information design
(information architecture). In her article, "Fragmented Future", DiNucci writes:[6][7][8]

The Web we know now, which loads into a browser window in essentially static screenfulls, is only an
embryo of the Web to come. The first glimmerings of Web 2.0 are beginning to appear, and we are just
starting to see how that embryo might develop. The Web will be understood not as screenfulls of text and
graphics but as a transport mechanism, the ether through which interactivity happens. It will [...] appear
on your computer screen, [...] on your TV set [...] your car dashboard [...] your cell phone [...] hand-held
game machines [...] maybe even your microwave oven.

Her use of the term deals mainly with Web design, aesthetics, and the interconnection of everyday
objects with the Internet; she argues that the Web is "fragmenting" due to the widespread use of portable
Web-ready devices. Her article is aimed at designers, reminding them to code for an ever-increasing
variety of hardware. As such, her use of the term hints at, but does not directly relate to, the current uses
of the term.

The term Web 2.0 did not resurface until 2003.[9][10][11][12] These authors focus on the concepts currently
associated with the term where, as Scott Dietzen puts it, "the Web becomes a universal, standards-based
integration platform".[11] John Robb wrote: "What is Web 2.0? It is a system that breaks with the old model
of centralized Web sites and moves the power of the Web/Internet to the desktop."[12]

In 2004, the term began its rise in popularity when O'Reilly Media and MediaLive hosted the first Web 2.0
conference. In their opening remarks, John Battelle and Tim O'Reilly outlined their definition of the "Web
as Platform", where software applications are built upon the Web as opposed to upon the desktop. The
unique aspect of this migration, they argued, is that "customers are building your business for you".
[13]
They argued that the activities of users generating content (in the form of ideas, text, videos, or
pictures) could be "harnessed" to create value. O'Reilly and Battelle contrasted Web 2.0 with what they
called "Web 1.0". They associated Web 1.0 with the business models of Netscape and the Encyclopædia
Britannica Online. For example,

Netscape framed "the web as platform" in terms of the old software paradigm: their flagship product was
the web browser, a desktop application, and their strategy was to use their dominance in the browser
market to establish a market for high-priced server products. Control over standards for displaying content
and applications in the browser would, in theory, give Netscape the kind of market power enjoyed by
Microsoft in the PC market. Much like the "horseless carriage" framed the automobile as an extension of
the familiar, Netscape promoted a "webtop" to replace the desktop, and planned to populate that webtop
with information updates and applets pushed to the webtop by information providers who would purchase
Netscape servers.[14]

In short, Netscape focused on creating software, updating it on occasion, and distributing it to the end
users. O'Reilly contrasted this with Google, a company which did not at the time focus on producing
software, such as a browser, but instead focused on providing a service based on data such as the links
Web page authors make between sites. Google exploits this user-generated content to offer Web search
based on reputation through its "page rank" algorithm. Unlike software, which undergoes scheduled
releases, such services are constantly updated, a process called "the perpetual beta". A similar difference
can be seen between the Encyclopædia Britannica Online and Wikipedia: while the Britannica relies upon
experts to create articles and releases them periodically in publications, Wikipedia relies on trust in
anonymous users to constantly and quickly build content. Wikipedia is not based on expertise but rather
an adaptation of the open source software adage "given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow", and it
produces and updates articles constantly. O'Reilly's Web 2.0 conferences have been held every year
since 2004, attracting entrepreneurs, large companies, and technology reporters.

In terms of the lay public, the term Web 2.0 was largely championed by bloggers and by technology
journalists, culminating in the 2006 TIME magazine Person of The Year (You).[15] That is, TIME selected
the masses of users who were participating in content creation on social networks, blogs, wikis, and
media sharing sites. The cover story author Lev Grossman explains:

It's a story about community and collaboration on a scale never seen before. It's about the cosmic
compendium of knowledge Wikipedia and the million-channel people's network YouTube and the online
metropolis MySpace. It's about the many wresting power from the few and helping one another for
nothing and how that will not only change the world, but also change the way the world changes.It's a
story about community and collaboration on a scale never seen before.

Since that time, Web 2.0 has found a place in the lexicon; in 2009 Global Language Monitor declared it to
be the one-millionth English word.[16]

[edit]Characteristics
Flickr, a Web 2.0 web site that allows its users to upload and share photos

Web 2.0 websites allow users to do more than just retrieve information. By increasing what was already
possible in "Web 1.0", they provide the user with more user-interface, software and storage facilities, all
through their browser. This has been called "Network as platform" computing.[3] Users can provide the
data that is on a Web 2.0 site and exercise some control over that data.[3][17] These sites may have an
"Architecture of participation" that encourages users to add value to the application as they use it.[2][3]

The concept of Web-as-participation-platform captures many of these characteristics. Bart Decrem, a

founder and former CEO of Flock, calls Web 2.0 the "participatory Web"[18] and regards the Web-as-
information-source as Web 1.0.

The impossibility of excluding group-members who don’t contribute to the provision of goods from sharing
profits gives rise to the possibility that rational members will prefer to withhold their contribution of effort
and free-ride on the contribution of others.[19] This requires what is sometimes called Radical Trust by the
management of the website. According to Best,[20] the characteristics of Web 2.0 are: rich user
experience, user participation, dynamic content, metadata, web standards and scalability. Further
characteristics, such as openness, freedom[21] and collective intelligence[22] by way of user participation,
can also be viewed as essential attributes of Web 2.0.

[edit]Technologies

The client-side/web browser technologies typically used in Web 2.0 development are Asynchronous
JavaScript and XML (Ajax), Adobe Flash and the Adobe Flexframework, and JavaScript/Ajax frameworks
such as Yahoo! UI Library, Dojo Toolkit, MooTools, and jQuery. Ajax programming uses JavaScript to
upload and download new data from the web server without undergoing a full page reload.

To allow users to continue to interact with the page, communications such as data requests going to the
server are separated from data coming back to the page (asynchronously). Otherwise, the user would
have to routinely wait for the data to come back before they can do anything else on that page, just as a
user has to wait for a page to complete the reload. This also increases overall performance of the site, as
the sending of requests can complete quicker independent of blocking and queueing required to send
data back to the client.

The data fetched by an Ajax request is typically formatted in XML or JSON (JavaScript Object Notation)
format, two widely used structured data formats. Since both of these formats are natively understood by
JavaScript, a programmer can easily use them to transmit structured data in their web application. When
this data is received via Ajax, the JavaScript program then uses the Document Object Model (DOM) to
dynamically update the web page based on the new data, allowing for a rapid and interactive user
experience. In short, using these techniques, Web designers can make their pages function like desktop
applications. For example, Google Docs uses this technique to create a Web-based word processor.

Adobe Flex is another technology often used in Web 2.0 applications. Compared to JavaScript libraries
like jQuery, Flex makes it easier for programmers to populate large data grids, charts, and other heavy
user interactions.[23] Applications programmed in Flex, are compiled and displayed as Flash within the
browser. As a widely available plugin independent of W3C (World Wide Web Consortium, the governing
body of web standards and protocols), standards, Flash is capable of doing many things which are not
currently possible in HTML, the language used to construct web pages. Of Flash's many capabilities, the
most commonly used in Web 2.0 is its ability to play audio and video files. This has allowed for the
creation of Web 2.0 sites where video media is seamlessly integrated with standard HTML.

In addition to Flash and Ajax, JavaScript/Ajax frameworks have recently become a very popular means of
creating Web 2.0 sites. At their core, these frameworks do not use technology any different from
JavaScript, Ajax, and the DOM. What frameworks do is smooth over inconsistencies between web
browsers and extend the functionality available to developers. Many of them also come with
customizable, prefabricated 'widgets' that accomplish such common tasks as picking a date from a
calendar, displaying a data chart, or making a tabbed panel.

On the server side, Web 2.0 uses many of the same technologies as Web 1.0. New Languages such
as PHP, Ruby, ColdFusion, Perl, Python, JSP and ASP are used by developers to dynamically output
data using information from files and databases. What has begun to change in Web 2.0 is the way this
data is formatted. In the early days of the Internet, there was little need for different websites to
communicate with each other and share data. In the new "participatory web", however, sharing data
between sites has become an essential capability. To share its data with other sites, a web site must be
able to generate output in machine-readable formats such as XML, RSS, and JSON. When a site's data
is available in one of these formats, another website can use it to integrate a portion of that site's
functionality into itself, linking the two together. When this design pattern is implemented, it ultimately
leads to data that is both easier to find and more thoroughly categorized, a hallmark of the philosophy
behind the Web 2.0 movement.

[edit]Concepts

Web 2.0 draws together the capabilities of client- and server-side software, content syndication and the
use of network protocols. Standards-oriented web browsers may use plug-ins and software extensions to
handle the content and the user interactions. Web 2.0 sites provide users with information storage,
creation, and dissemination capabilities that were not possible in the environment now known as "Web
1.0".

Web 2.0 websites typically include some of the following features and techniques. Andrew McAfee used
the acronym SLATES to refer to them:[24]

Search
Finding information through keyword search.
Links
Connects information together into a meaningful information ecosystem using the model of the
Web, and provides low-barrier social tools.
Authoring
The ability to create and update content leads to the collaborative work of many rather than just a
few web authors. In wikis, users may extend, undo and redo each other's work. In blogs, posts
and the comments of individuals build up over time.
Tags
Categorization of content by users adding "tags" - short, usually one-word descriptions - to
facilitate searching, without dependence on pre-made categories. Collections of tags created by
many users within a single system may be referred to as "folksonomies" (i.e., folk taxonomies).
Extensions
Software that makes the Web an application platform as well as a document server. These
include software like Adobe Reader, Adobe Flash player, Microsoft Silverlight, ActiveX, Oracle
Java, Quicktime, Windows Media, etc.
Signals
The use of syndication technology such as RSS to notify users of content changes.

While SLATES forms the basic framework of Enterprise 2.0, it does not contradict all of the higher level
Web 2.0 design patterns and business models. In this way, a new Web 2.0 report from O'Reilly is quite
effective and diligent in interweaving the story of Web 2.0 with the specific aspects of Enterprise 2.0. It
includes discussions of self-service IT, the long tail of enterprise IT demand, and many other
consequences of the Web 2.0 era in the enterprise. The report also makes many sensible
 recommendations around starting small with pilot projects and measuring results, among a fairly long list.
[25]

[edit]Usage

Web 2.0 technologies are changing the way messages spread across the Web. A number of online tools
and platforms are now defining how people share their perspectives, opinions, thoughts and
experiences. Here are some popular web 2.0 tools:

Podcasting
Blogs
RSS
Social bookmarking
Social networking

The popularity of the term Web 2.0, along with the increasing use of blogs, wikis, and social networking
technologies, has led many in academia and business to coin a flurry of 2.0s,[26] including Library 2.0,
[27]
Social Work 2.0,[28] Enterprise 2.0, PR 2.0,[29] Classroom 2.0,[30] Publishing 2.0,[31] Medicine 2.0,[32] Telco
2.0, Travel 2.0, Government 2.0,[33] and even Porn 2.0.[34] Many of these 2.0s refer to Web 2.0
technologies as the source of the new version in their respective disciplines and areas. For example, in
the Talis white paper "Library 2.0: The Challenge of Disruptive Innovation", Paul Miller argues

Blogs, wikis and RSS are often held up as exemplary manifestations of Web 2.0. A reader of a blog or a
wiki is provided with tools to add a comment or even, in the case of the wiki, to edit the content. This is
what we call the Read/Write web. Talis believes that Library 2.0 means harnessing this type of
participation so that libraries can benefit from increasingly rich collaborative cataloguing efforts, such as
including contributions from partner libraries as well as adding rich enhancements, such as book jackets
or movie files, to records from publishers and others.[35]

Here, Miller links Web 2.0 technologies and the culture of participation that they engender to the field of
library science, supporting his claim that there is now a "Library 2.0". Many of the other proponents of new
2.0s mentioned here use similar methods. However, web 2.0 usage is a role dependant as Dennis D.
McDonalds claimed. For example, Ordinary people use web 2.0 to establish and maintain relationships
through social networks while marketing managers use this promising technology to "end- run
unresponsive I.T. department" as Mr. McDonalds mentioned.[36]

There is a debate over the use of Web 2.0 technologies in mainstream education. Issues under
consideration include the understanding of students' different learning modes; the conflicts between ideas
entrenched in informal on-line communities and educational establishments' views on the production and
 authentication of 'formal' knowledge; and questions about privacy, plagiarism, shared authorship and the
ownership of knowledge and information produced and/or published on line.[37]

Marketing
For marketers, Web 2.0 offers an opportunity to engage consumes. A growing number of marketers are
using Web 2.0 tools to collaborate with consumers on product development, service enhancement and
promotion. Companies can use Web 2.0 tools to improve collaboration with both its business partners and
consumers. Among other things, company employees have created wikis -- Web sites that allow users to
add, delete and edit content -- to list answers to frequently asked questions about each product, and
consumers have added significant contributions. Another marketing Web 2.0 lure is to make sure
consumers can use the online community to network among themselves on topics of their own choosing.
[38]

Mainstream media usage of web 2.0 usage is increasing. Saturating media hubs - like New York
Times, PC Magazine and Business Week - with links to popular new web sites and services, is critical to
achieving the threshold for mass adoption of those services.[39]
Web 2.0 offers financial institutions abundant opportunities to engage with customers. Networks such
as Twitter, Yelp and Facebook are now becoming common elements of multichannel and customer
loyalty strategies, and banks are beginning to use these sites proactively to spread their messages. In a
recent article for Bank Technology News, Shane Kite describes how Citigroup's Global Transaction
Services unit monitors social media outlets to address customer issues and improve products.
Furthermore, the FI uses Twitter to release "breaking news" and upcoming events, and YouTube to
disseminate videos that feature executives speaking about market news.[40]
Small businesses have become more competitive by usine Web 2.0 marketing strategies to compete with
larger companies. As new businesses grow and develop, new technology is used decrease the gap
between businesses and customers. Social networks have become more intuitive and user friendly to
provide information that is easily reached by the end user. For example, Companies use Twitter to offer
customers coupons and discounts for products and services.[41]
[edit]Web-based applications and desktops
Ajax has prompted the development of websites that mimic desktop applications, such as word
processing, the spreadsheet, and slide-show presentation. In 2006 Google, Inc. acquired one of the best-
known sites of this broad class, Writely.[42] WYSIWYG wiki and blogging sites replicate many features of
PC authoring applications.

Several browser-based "operating systems" have emerged, including EyeOS[43] and YouOS.[44] Although
coined as such, many of these services function less like a traditional operating system and more as an
application platform. They mimic the user experience of desktop operating-systems, offering features
 and applications similar to a PC environment, and are able to run within any modern browser. However,
these operating systems do not directly control the hardware on the client's computer.

Numerous web-based application services appeared during the dot-com bubble of 1997–2001 and then
vanished, having failed to gain a critical mass of customers. In 2005, WebEx acquired one of the better-
known of these, Intranets.com, for $45 million.[45]

[edit]Internet applications
Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) are web 2.0 applications that have many of the characteristics of
desktop applications and are typically delivered via a browser.

[edit]Distribution of Media
[edit]XML and RSS
Many regard syndication of site content as a Web 2.0 feature. Syndication uses standardized protocols to
permit end-users to make use of a site's data in another context (such as another website, a browser
plugin, or a separate desktop application). Protocols which permit syndication include RSS (really simple
syndication, also known as web syndication), RDF (as in RSS 1.1), and Atom, all of them XML-based
formats. Observers have started to refer to these technologies as web feeds.

Specialized protocols such as FOAF and XFN (both for social networking) extend the functionality of
sites or permit end-users to interact without centralized websites.

[edit]Web APIs
Web 2.0 often uses machine-based interactions such as REST and SOAP. Servers often expose
proprietary APIs (Application Programming Interfaces), but standard APIs (for example, for posting to a
blog or notifying a blog update) have also come into use. Most communications through APIs involve XML
or JSON payloads.

REST APIs, through their use of self-descriptive messages and hypermedia as the engine of application
state, should be self describing once an entry URI is known. Web Services Description
Language (WSDL) is the standard way of publishing a SOAP API and there are a range of web service
specifications. EMML, or Enterprise Mashup Markup Language by the Open Mashup Alliance, is an XML
markup language for creating enterprise mashups.

[edit]Criticism

Critics of the term claim that "Web 2.0" does not represent a new version of the World Wide Web at all,
but merely continues to use so-called "Web 1.0" technologies and concepts. First, techniques such
as AJAXdo not replace underlying protocols like HTTP, but add an additional layer of abstraction on top of
them. Second, many of the ideas of Web 2.0 had already been featured in implementations on networked
systems well before the term "Web 2.0" emerged. Amazon.com, for instance, has allowed users to write
reviews and consumer guides since its launch in 1995, in a form of self-publishing. Amazon also opened
its API to outside developers in 2002.[46] Previous developments also came from research in computer-
supported collaborative learning and computer-supported cooperative work and from established
products like Lotus Notes and Lotus Domino, all phenomena which precede Web 2.0.

But perhaps the most common criticism is that the term is unclear or simply a buzzword. For example, in
a podcast interview,[4] Tim Berners-Lee described the term "Web 2.0" as a "piece of jargon":

"Nobody really knows what it means...If Web 2.0 for you is blogs and wikis, then that is people to people.
But that was what the Web was supposed to be all along."[4]

Other critics labeled Web 2.0 "a second bubble" (referring to the Dot-com bubble of circa 1995–2001),
suggesting that too many Web 2.0 companies attempt to develop the same product with a lack of
business models. For example, The Economist has dubbed the mid- to late-2000s focus on Web
companies "Bubble 2.0".[47] Venture capitalist Josh Kopelman noted that Web 2.0 had excited only 53,651
people (the number of subscribers at that time to TechCrunch, a Weblog covering Web 2.0 startups and
technology news), too few users to make them an economically viable target for consumer applications.
[48]
AlthoughBruce Sterling reports he's a fan of Web 2.0, he thinks it is now dead as a rallying concept.
[clarification needed][49]

Critics have cited the language used to describe the hype cycle of Web 2.0[50] as an example of Techno-
utopianist rhetoric.[51]

In terms of Web 2.0's social impact, critics such as Andrew Keen argue that Web 2.0 has created a cult of
digital narcissism and amateurism, which undermines the notion of expertise by allowing anybody,
anywhere to share and place undue value upon their own opinions about any subject and post any kind of
content, regardless of their particular talents, knowledge, credentials, biases or possible hidden agendas.
Keen's 2007 book, Cult of the Amateur, argues that the core assumption of Web 2.0, that all opinions and
user-generated content are equally valuable and relevant, is misguided. Additionally, Sunday Times
reviewer John Flintoff has characterized Web 2.0 as "creating an endless digital forest of mediocrity:
uninformed political commentary, unseemly home videos, embarrassingly amateurish music, unreadable
poems, essays and novels", and also asserted that Wikipedia is full of "mistakes, half truths and
misunderstandings".[52]

[edit]Trademark

In November 2004, CMP Media applied to the USPTO for a service mark on the use of the term "WEB
2.0" for live events.[53] On the basis of this application, CMP Media sent a cease-and-desist demand to
the Irish non-profit organization IT@Cork on May 24, 2006,[54] but retracted it two days later.[55] The "WEB
2.0" service mark registration passed final PTO Examining Attorney review on May 10, 2006, and was
registered on June 27, 2006.[53] The European Union application (application number 004972212, which
would confer unambiguous status in Ireland) was refused on May 23, 2007.

[edit]Web 3.0
See also: Semantic Web

Definitions of Web 3.0 vary greatly. Amit Agrawal states that Web 3.0 is, among other things, about
the Semantic Web and personalization.[56] Focusing on the computer elements, Conrad Wolfram has
argued that Web 3.0 is where "the computer is generating new information", rather than humans.[57]

Andrew Keen, author of The Cult of the Amateur, considers the Semantic Web an "unrealisable
abstraction" and sees Web 3.0 as the return of experts and authorities to the Web. For example, he
points to Bertelsman's deal with the German Wikipedia to produce an edited print version of that
encyclopedia. CNN Money's Jessi Hempel expects Web 3.0 to emerge from new and innovative Web
2.0 services with a profitable business model.[58] Others still such as Manoj Sharma, an organization
strategist, in the keynote "A Brave New World Of Web 3.0" proposes that Web 3.0 will be a "Totally
Integrated World" - cradle-to-grave experience of being always plugged onto the net.[59]

Futurist John Smart, lead author of the Metaverse Roadmap[60] echoes Sharma's perspective, defining
Web 3.0 as the first-generation Metaverse (convergence of the virtual and physical world), a web
development layer that includes TV-quality open video, 3D simulations, augmented reality, human-
constructed semantic standards, and pervasive broadband, wireless, and sensors. Web 3.0's early
geosocial (Foursquare, etc.) and augmented reality (Layar, etc.) webs are an extension of Web 2.0's
participatory technologies and social networks (Facebook, etc.) into 3D space. Of all its metaverse-like
developments, Smart suggests Web 3.0's most defining characteristic will be the mass diffusion of
NTSC-or-better quality open video to TVs, laptops, tablets, and mobile devices, a time when "the
internet swallows the television."[61] Smart considers Web 4.0 to be the Semantic Web and in particular,
the rise of statistical, machine-constructed semantic tags and algorithms, driven by broad collective use
of conversational interfaces, perhaps circa 2020.[62] David Siegel's perspective in Pull: The Power of the
Semantic Web, 2009, is consonant with this, proposing that the growth of human-constructed semantic
standards and data will be a slow, industry-specific incremental process for years to come, perhaps
unlikely to tip into broad social utility until after 2020.