Post 1 - Web 2.0

I consider myself to be fairly tech-savvy. Computers have been a part of my life, at least since early elementary school. I remember the transition to Windows...and being absolutely thrilled the day that we got to "chat" with SysAdmin in our seventh grade computer lit class. Internet Explorer 2.0 was beautiful (at the time!) and how could things get any better?!

I remember designing my first web pages by hand, using Notepad, and my trusty HTML for Dummies book. My first full time job was as a web designer, and I still "coded" my sites by hand, because it was faster and more efficient than clunky Frontpage. That first full time job of mine was in the summer of 1999...

What a difference a decade makes. The slow, clunky web that drew us together has become a tighter knit. Everyone can (and in many cases is encouraged!) to leave their digital mark. As the Internet becomes "upgraded", the greatest improvement is that it becomes increasingly user-friendly. Students with absolutely no programming knowledge and only a mediocre amount of skill can upload video, create blog posts and do a whole variety of other tasks. The beauty of web 2.0 is that virtually anyone can tailor it to suit their personal (or business, or academic, or social, or...) needs.

As I contemplate the strands of creativity that make our web today what it is, the history fan in me craved to know more. I found an article by InformationWeek (InformationWeek.com) that establishes a brief historical timeline of the evolution of web 2.0. Interestingly, InformationWeek points to the founding of a search engine project called BackRub as the beginning of web 2.0. BackRub was unique in that it was able to analyze hyperlink structure in order to suggest the best pages for any given search string. At the time, 1996, this was absolutely revolutionary. Today, we take Google, the search engine BackRub eventually developed into, for granted.

In 1999, the first weblogs, or blogs, began to appear. August 2009 marks the ten year anniversary of Blogger.com. Users were able to create their own content for the web with little more effort than it takes to create a word processing document. In 2001, Wikipedia, a user-driven encyclopedia source, was launched.

If the greatest evolution in the web is the user functions, then the user experience may also be its greatest challenge. Aaron Ricadela describes a balancing act as developers try to match technical needs to user desires, and there is fierce competition within the industry as companies try to anticipate the user desires. A flashy website will only go so far in keeping a user (or potential customer) interested if the content is lacky. Ricadela explains that users "Google" for information and go to "iTunes" for their music needs; though Microsoft has been on the scene for a while, there is no brand loyalty in cyberspace. Successful companies are, and will continue to be, those that are able to anticipate and adapt to meet the needs of the consumers.

In summary, the web has been continually growing and reshaping itself, especially now that individuals are able to take a hand in the creative process. The web will be ever evolving, and will (for better or worse) continually be a work in progress.

References:

InformationWeek.com. (n.d.). A brief history of web 2.0. Retrieved August 7, 2009 from InformationWeek website http://www.informationweek.com/1113/IDweb20_timeline.jhtml;jsessionid=23QQDCFOHAU1JQE1GHRSKHWATMY32JVN

Ricadela, A. The user experience. Retrieved August 5, 2009 from InformationWeek website http://www.informationweek.com/news/software/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=193501649&pgno=6.