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The State of Web 2.0, The Future of Web Software
SphereOfInfluence writes "Despite some disdain for the term Web 2.0, the underlying ideas seem to be genuinely taking off from the seed of successful techniques of the first generation of the Web. Here's an in-depth review of the future of Web 2.0 and online software from Web 2.0 proponent, Dion Hinchcliffe. Like or hate the term, the actual ideas in Web 2.0 are turning out to not only usable but a growing cadre of companies are actively being successful with them. This includes the Ajax phenomenon being actively pursued by Microsoft and Google, widespread social software, and massive online communities like MySpace. These trends are all leading to predictions on the ultimate fallout of these changes, something increasingly called social computing. "
It's just CSS mixed with javascript... is it not?
Meh.
Sweet jesus christ am I sick of hearing that phrase.
That's what really drives the web technology!
I know you guys don't like buzzwords... so here are a bunch of buzzwords.
"Web2.0" is still-another-stupid-buzzword and, technically, doesn't exist.
/. readers?
Why do I have to tell this to
This "web 2.0" isn't some massive leap in technology. Nothing really revolutionary has been done to warrant the coining of the term or the implication that it's something new and improved. In the 10 years I've been on the internet, I've watched the slow evolution from barely-useful tool to amazing source of information to social phenomenon. Much of what is being heralded as new and amazing existed in very basic form early on; techniques are simply steadily improving.
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
Is this a ratified standard by an official body? (NO!)
Is this being used primarily for marketing? (YES!)
Who cares? (NOONE!)
MySpace is not 'Web 2.0'. It's 'GeoCities 2.0' if anything.
The problem with Web 2.0 is that it is nothing more than a marketing term. We've had social networking for decades in the form of Usenet. There hasn't been any major shift in the way we use the internet. At least not one that deserves the 2.0 moniker.
Religion for nerds. Stuff that really matters
The Bozo bit has been flipped!
"You're everywhere. You're omnivorous."
...so we have just come to realize that the power of a network is that there are people on the network. WOW. These business folks a AMAZING. Sounds like they are trying to wrap an internet on top of the internet. The problem I see with the community thing is that it will bulk out and become crap just like 80% of the internet is crap.
A few popular websites and clever use of existing technologies does not make something "new" in the computing world.
So, when mp3's were introduced and PHP became popular, was that web 1.5?
What is web 3.0? Online TV shows?
This kind of nonsense really annoys me. Let us not let the marketeers ruin the Internet.
They mean pursued (I'm assuming), not perused.
This is a pretty long article, so I'll sum it up for you guys by taking the important passages:
Also, this image is a particularly interesting comparison of the growth of various Web 2.0 sites. The author finishes with some predictions:
Remaining predictions: 1-The hype is going to ramp down quite a bit this year. 2- People will focus much more on using the ideas and ignoring the Web 2.0 hypesters more often. And 3- A lot of folks will still hate the term Web 2.0.
If there's one thing I can't stand, it's forced upgrades. I'll stick with my Web 1.1.19 (experimental), thank you very much.
This guy's the limit!
It's interesting that the majority of these "Web 2.0" companies are still making their money off of paid advertisements, which seems to be a very "old web" business model. Are there any companies that are doing new and interesting things with commerce itself?
I read on Saturday that yahoo already bought web 2.0. All of it.
"Web 2.0" has been around since 1654. It's more popular now than it was then. Tune in next week for the exciting revelation that it isnt popular anymore.
In all seriousness, though: increased use of virtual machines and security and such will make "lolit'slikeanapplicationbutinawebbrowserzomg" unneccessary. The idea that it is popular for security reasons is actually, from a security standpoint, sickening. That's just a great way to look at how sorry the state of every other part of the security world is.
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
Much of the interactivity and cross platform capability we're being promised with AJAX sounds suspiciously like the buzz surrounding Java applets 10 years or so ago. However, AJAX is currently in a pretty primitive state. You still have to worry about browser compatibility issues. Tools and libraries are pretty simplistic. You also face the fun issue of dealing with yet another programming language, in addition to whatever HTML, SQL, and XML you're using, plus your server-side language of choice.
Given all of this, is AJAX really worth it for web applications?
Your design to a real part online: Big Blue Saw
Web 2.0? Hardly.
How about Web 1.21 beta?
Or even better, how about just understanding that the changes in the way the Web is used are incremental and calling it "Web 2.0" in 2006 is just as silly as calling it "Web.com" in 1999 would have been.
Regardless of what it's called, the intent is to make sure people are aware that the Web offers experiences different from what it offered to the mainstream even three years ago. Because we all need to feel good about the newfangled Web we're using, right? We shouldn't take all the goodiness for granted, right?
The Web is a utility, that's all. It's not new and improved version 2.0! It's the same constantly evolving data transfer utility it's ever been.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
One of my favourite innovations in recent years has been StumbleUpon. It's a very simple idea — you install a StumbleUpon Firefox toolbar and click the "Thumbs Up" button when you come across sites you like, or the "Thumbs Down" button for sites you don't like. This way, StumbleUpon builds up a profile of the sorts of web surfer you are, and will then offer up a suggested website when you hit the "Stumble" button.
Using StumbleUpon, I've been presented with many really cool websites I woudn't have been able to find using Google, because I wouldn't have known to search for them. It seems my own interests are interactive flash websites, mathematics news, food, and philosophy. You mileage will vary, but will be catered for none the less.
Phoenix, Boston, Little Rock, see a pattern?
Since people were looking for a name which reflected the parallel with 'AJAX', they were forced to select another name which made you want to stab yourself.
Old school thinking. That was only really true years ago when "legit" business was still new to the Internet. In my opinion, Porn really hasn't moved that much since the 2000 timeframe. Sure, there are better video codecs, but they are nolonger the product of porn production.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
... mobile phones. It's rather accepted that JApan in some respects is ahead of us as far as technical innovation and acceptance of tech. For the Asian countries - phones and functional mobiles are sprinting out ahead. A couple of Japanese contractors I recently worked with, in my age range, were rather disdainful of terminals and preferred to do a lot of things on handhelds. One was actually surprised that I was always notebook equipped. There are logistic issues involved - namely, the Japanese are a small people with smaller hands - suited well to handhelds, but nonetheless.... mobiles are the future of web tech.
the mobile companies here stifle innovation. it's the mobiles that are missing the boat.
Web 2.0 is not about tech. It's about marketers finally realizing what the fuck has been happening on the web since its dawn - and their need to put words to it. the future of the web is that you take it with you - not fucking MySpace.
un burrito me trampeó.
From something I wrote on this subject:
The "killer apps" of tomorrow's mobile infocom industry won't be hardware devices or software programs but social practices. --Howard Rheingold
In his recent essay, Paul Graham pans Web 2.0 because it can't be used to make predictions. Paul is right; the reason is that we have been classing Web 2.0 by its technology instead of its social implications.
Because, really, who gives a shit about technology? I don't care about technology, I care about me. I don't want to know how Web 2.0 will get me AJAX, I want to know how Web 2.0 well get me laid.
When caught in the throes of our meme 2.0 ideations, it should be the social over the technological that inspires. When we do this, not only can we make falsifiable predictions, but we can make actionable business plans and compelling emotional appeals as well.
So if you think it's too late to start a billion dollar AJAX business... You're right. But don't worry; the revolution isn't over, it's barely begun.
For all the talk of CSS and XHTML making content more accessible, I find it funny that color-blind people are brushed under the rug with all the low-contrast designs most of these Web 2.0 sites are sporting.
We can be interactive application snobs all we want to but the corporate PHBs are already eating this stuff up. That's why there's all the buzz right now. That means that for the next several years until the next buzzword item comes up, there'll be good money in knowing this stuff. I'd rather be an employed Web 2.0 programmer than an unemployed COBOL programmer.
Since the trend seems to be going this way, it should be possible to predict what the next buzzword item will be, too. Just look at what UNIX was doing 28 years ago and the answer should be there somewhere...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Accept no substitutes!
global platform
democratized
decentralized
commoditizing
control structures
power
socialize
engage
interchange
The first thing you should learn is that when someone is using buzzwords, they're attempting to sell you on something, not inform you. Selling appeals to emotions.
From articles I read 3 or 4 years ago, I was under the impression that Web 2.0 technologies were mostly focused on adding semantic data to the web. Web 2.0 was supposed to enable increased machine interface to the web. It seems that this keyword has been reassigned to simply encompass any recent web technologies as the semantic information trend hasn't really yielded any big results yet (I think we can all agree that rss and such are having less impact on users than AJAX interfaces that everyone and their mother are adding to web apps. They really do change the user experience significantly, especially for novice users.)
Web 2.0 is the word you are going to hear in the staff meeting of IT department for years to come. Just call it what it is, a buzz word and nothing else. I can hear every CIO telling their drones "We need to build a site in this new age of 'Web 2.0' and proactively create synergy between our e-business and client".
Granted, there are a lot of new development and trends going on, and things from ajax to user created contents are really going to change the way we view the web, that does not make the web to the stage of "2.0". For me, web is (hopefully) ever evolving, and it will just be THE web, with no version number attached at the end.
They just coin the phrase so the dumbass recruiters can have a buzzword when they recruit you. It's as bad as Java 2 or Java 5, etc being called 1.2 or 1.5. I had a recruiter ask me once if I knew Java 2.0. I was like.. umm there is no such thing. He's like, What is Java 2 then? I am like, some dumb thing Sun started.
these have been on my mind whilst developing a nifty ajax enabled web app:
#1 Accessibility
how does dynamically changing a page work for blind users with readers - probably very badly. I think there needs to be some kind of notification we can do in JS to say 'this bit has changed, read it again'
#2 Compatibility
I use windows. Even with the 3 main browsers here (IE, FF & Opera) i have to make tweaks to get around the "2 out of 3" problem - when 2 browsers display what i want and the other doesnt. so you do another tweak, break another browser. What do Safari bods see when they go to my site? I dunno. I could try that great site where the guy renders an image of a page on a mac but thats very busy these days and i cant interact with my page.
I'm NOT buying a mac just to check if something works with them for the very small % of users who have actually got one. However if somebody made a mac server farm where i could VNC in and run the browser - cool, i'd pay for time on that.
or make OSX work inside the VMWare player... i reckon i could fork out for a copy of OSX
ok for large corps this isnt a problem but for smaller sites that can hardly make the server money every month i cant see them lashing out for extra hardware for such a small return.
In this case, could Web 2.0 kill the mac? Or are we going back to 'best viewied with' all over our sites again?
I think I'll wait for 2.1. I never use a dot-zero release: Let others find the bugs first
It's rather ironic that we're trying to get browsers to do what other application platforms have been able to do since the late 1970s. I sometimes wonder if the web browser, like the gopher client before it, should be dropped for something, well, a little less kludgy and arcane.
It is also ironic that these days the distributed capability of X Windows (-display host:server:screen) is very portable, efficient, universal, and ignored for a less universal solution, HTTP.
an ill wind that blows no good
I've got your web 2.0 right here.
Kiteboarding Gear Mention slashdot and get 10% off!
We really need an "open source" replacement for MySpace. It's dangerous to allow a private corporation to run a network that is gaining so much importance, particularly among the youth.
...I'm recommending we treat it like a p2p app so it scales well, also. Say every computer on the node houses 100 of the nearest houses and avatars and MySpace walls of the other 99 users in that "node".... Then whethter the other 99 people are on or not, other people can still visit any house (or myspace wall) in that node, so long as at least one member of the node is online. Maybe 100 is too high a number, but given what the average pc is capable of these days, I doubt it.
What would be IDEAL, however would be a fully interactive metaverse, ala quake 2 with real time voice for people within 50 "yards" of each other. And virtual houses that could still house the virtual MySpace replacement on one wall.
I've got $50 for anyone with a working prototype.....
Let me know when you've got it up and running....
rhY
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
No, strike that. You are bastard 2.0. Posting drivel under your slashdot moniker and talking about yourself in 3rd person
I must be thick (come guys, tell me), but this article strikes me as falling into the "meaningless bubble diagrams connecting unconnectable things" category. I did like the graphs at the end that give you some numbers on ajax traffic.
But all that other crap? Like (and I quote):
Key Aspects of Web 2.0:
- The Web and all its connected devices as one global platform of reusable services and data
- Data consumption and remixing from all sources, particularly user generated data
- Continuous and seamless update of software and data, often very rapidly
- Rich and interactive user interfaces
- Architecture of participation that encourages user contribution
Good God where does this dross emanate from? These are the engineering principles that bind together Web 2.0 concepts? It's notable that these attributes can also describe a client/server or 3-tier application, if you hold head just right. They could also describe how my grandmother's recipee book worked. Very interactive... encouraged user participation and contribution (that's what the pencil dangling from it was for).
If you're the hard-core engineering type, spare yourself a disorienting tour of pseduo-engineering psycho-babble and skip to the graphs at the end.
Was I too harsh?
- The Kessel run is for nerf herders. I can circumnavigate the entire Central Finite Curve in a lot less than 12 parse
I don't understand why the coining of an umbrella term that describes a set of technologies and technique receives so much backlash from the /. crowd.
Think Google "keyword" -- have you ever tried to search for ambiguous technical terms on Google? If I search for "web 2.0 *insert any relevant term here*" I have an excellent chance of finding what I'm looking for. Same goes for "jboss" or "ubuntu" etc.
I, for one, welcome our umbrella term-coining overlords.
body massage!
When I read the headline I thought the article was referring to Internet 2, which of course is REAL. Its what my university is connected to and it makes for very accessible high-speed porn from other Internet 2 capable universities.
Bah! Web 2.0 is so outmoded.
If you're not running Web 2.1, you might as well go back to the bad old days when people actually used client software for email and instant messaging. 2.1 is the only way of doing stuff online.
You can get a demo of what's on offer here: http://cheese.blartwendo.com/web21-demo.html
Meanwhile, supporters will be pleased to hear about the imminent release of the long awaited Web 2.1 offshoot, Azotaemia 2.1.
There has been a major scientific break-in
Web 2.0? As Microsoft is involved everyone knows it won't be usable until Web 3.1 is released... although it will be named Web 2010.
Personally I'm sticking with eXtreme Web.
I have been investigating some of these tool sets and so far I would say morfik has
everyone stomped by a long shot.
The still however have large strikes against them.
Their visual development environment only runs on windows...strike one. The platform
thus far is closed source...strike two. On a plus note the compiled applications run
cross platform. On another plus note you can deploy locally disconnected as well
as connected. It supports 4 major languages as well which is another plus.
No I do not have any interest in morfik just stating some observations.
Got Code?
Let's start Web 3.0. Just an idea and a phrase for the next level of web browsing. It will include smell-a-vision, of course, as well as touchable sites (the later more successful for the porn industry).
Can I bum a sig?
This is all semantic diversion, to put it politely. Some proponents of Web 2.0 are apparently hoping that by changing the definition of Web 2.0. they can make it look like Web 2.0 has actually proceeded in a meaningful direction. Web 2.0 has absolutely nothing to do with AJAX (AJAZ is just a fancy name for doing more on the client side with JavaScript and CSS, which is why they call it AJAX, because if they said 'client-side user interface development in JavaScript across an asynchronous network connection' everyone would rightly turn around and flee), social networking, or uploading your photos to Flickr.
If you read the original articles and specifications, such that exist, you will see that Web 2.0 is an envisioning of logical markup to enable machine intelligence in agents that work for the user. Web 2.0 envisions intelligent spiders that can follow logical paths (x is contained by y, y is a type of z, etc.), as well as a whole host of software serving the user living on top of this content and process. Look at the New Scientist article by Tim Berners-Lee awhile back (someone will have to find the link). Now, whether or not that's feasible anytime soon is debatable, but let's not be fooled by marketing chicanery into thinking that Web 2.0 has come about just because JavaScript development has been given a pretty name, social networking sites are all the rage (sixdegress.com was around from before the last bubble, it's just the new fad), and some Web services actually exist.
Each instance of said application is going to consume massive resources (on the server..again not the X server), and is ABSOLUTELY NOT SCALABLE!
As opposed to spawning a new process or thread to handle the HTTP connection? There really isn't much difference. Your criticism might be valid if the world still connected to the internet through ppp. It is not. Considering the explosive growth in high speed networking I think the X solution has finally come of age.
Compare the HTTP architecture with X. You have a few significantly incompatable browsers that are among the most complex programs ever written. There is no steady definition of what these cesspools of code really are. For all that complexity it is remarkable how little they do! HTTP servers are less complex but must be programmed at an absurdly low level. Get into multi-tiered architectures and you have to wonder if people are designing on acid. Page navigation is a huge problem for programs with dynamic content. Those pages are generated inefficiently again and again. Information is typically passed uncompressed across the wire, which is silly.
X client interfaces (GTK/GDK, Xt/Motif, Qt, ...) are amazingly rich and robust. Your programs work perfectly remotely or locally by definition. As a programmer you never see the X protocol, which is as it should be.
Network-wise this is not ideal either as their is a tremendous amount of inefficient bi-directional communication just to click buttons and type in fields.
Bi-directional communication is sort of essential for any network app. Also all significant actions behind those HTTP button clicks are done on the server side to there is no effective difference. HTTP interfaces are very primative of course they are more efficient. Your point is invalid.
an ill wind that blows no good
It's rather ironic that we're trying to get browsers to do what other application platforms have been able to do since the late 1970s. I sometimes wonder if the web browser, like the gopher client before it, should be dropped for something, well, a little less kludgy and arcane.
I know quite well why my boss fancies Web 2.0 because he hopes it will solve his cross-platform needs. Whatever business you do these days as soon as it gets a certain size you are faced with multiple platforms. My boss hates having different platforms but he couldn't avoid it so far. And my boss also likes to have it nice and beauty. So far none of what he tried satisfied him, even standardizing on Java for everything was enough. But I don't want to rant on Java now, I just want to tell you that my boss now thinks Web 2.0 is the solution. I on the other side know that Web 2.0 has its use for some kind of work (web of course) while Java had and will have its uses for other tasks as will have my own solution for the desktop (see http://wyoguide.sf.net/papers/Cross-platform.html) . But it just needs some time until the hype is over, until everything is sorted out. And of course until people realize what's their best and what's hype.
O. Wyss
See http://wyoguide.sf.net/papers/Cross-platform.html
Radio Mix Tape is a new service that lets people make mix tapes, and swap them. Entirely out of the kind of free tracks that bands put on their website. And its starting to gain support from artists. Big ones too. On yeah and we now have fancy Blog Widgets (checkout this blog here
-Jason
P.S. Yes I own it, I made it, but we have a team working hard on our 1.0 version and I am extremely proud of it.
Nobody posting here seems to grasp the real significance that underlies the idea of "Web 2.0". I think a lot of this has to do with a limited focus being placed on the current applications of the existing technologies that "Web 2.0" encompasses (e.g., RSS, XML, AJAX, etc.). But let's get away from all of that. First of all, the label "Web 2.0" - as stupid as it is - is appropriate only because of one utterly significant fact: HTTP-centric network structure is (or rather, will be) a thing of the past. Appropriate or not, however, a new term should be coined, because this one makes superficial users roll their eyes before they even take the time to consider the movement's real potential. I will call it the MetaWeb, even though that's almost as lame. At least we can get used to NOT using "Web 2.0" any longer.
Back to the point: Internet sans HTTP. Maybe that's too drastic. Let's say that HTTP becomes just another service in a pool of equally pervasive and useful services for data presentation retrieval. The MetaWeb consists of a distributed network of servers that house data of any sort, with each data entity being encapsulated with metadata (I believe this is what is meant by "semantic data" in "Web 2.0" buzzdom).
A music recording would be encapsulated with all relevant artist, album, copyright, etc. information, as well as any number of keywords or other meta information that could serve a useful purpose for one accessing that data. Links to other similar content, a link to an accompanying video (or any number of such videos), lyrics data, etc. The point is that all data exists in this web within logically discrete packets that are encapsulated in such a way as to be (theoretically) transferrable to and interpreted by any presentation-oriented client (e.g. a MetaWeb browser, a Flash program, an old-school web page with AJAX), as well as being easily associated (by any old computer) to other, related data. The closest thing to this data unit in "Web 1.0" is called a "file" (new concept there, write it down) and it's not very useful as it currently stands. MIME type labels are not perfect. XML is obviously great for this encapsulation, but it only really helps if all data in a network follows the practice of semantic labeling.
I don't want to lose all the geeks with any more buzz words or theoretical uses for the MetaWeb. Hopefully some idea can be gleaned from this that sparks up a mental light bulb. I'd rather get into the nitty gritty of how the MetaWeb network can be established. This is not some buzz-oriented new business model, or something strictly applicable to social networking or a moderate increase in indepedent publishing. It is available for all of these purposes, but it is far more significant in its reach. This is like inventing the printing press.
I think about DNS and how its resource allocation has been perverted over the years by InterNIC. I think about the HTTP protocol and how it limits connective structure to content-embedded links. I see potential for eliminating both, using an Internet-wide, content-oriented network. One that is intrinsically searchable (read: decentralized Google database). Rather than a distributed, loosely organized semi-heirarchy of domain name servers, we establish a similar semi-heirarchy (I say semi-heirarchy because a heirarchy only comes into existence out of practice, not out of necessity) of content labeling and indexing servers, each of which may or may not house any arbitrary volume of content to which such indexes can refer. Domain names become a thing of the past on the web (still useful for e.g. mail servers) . You establish and brand your identity directly within the content you provide.
The interface to the internet then becomes strictly search- and link-based. "It already practically is that," you say. True, but it's:
1) really, incredibly difficult to make it this way. See: Google.
2) still limited, even with Google or other, clustering search engines.
3) barely reach
Is the link of the in-depth review using Web 2.0? If yes, I need urgently a patch, as it is not working on my Firefox... Where can I find the bugzilla to post a new bug? When will be 2.1 released?
Well yes it would be silly if it were true. HTTP has compression and caching built in. You don't seem very familiar with HTTP at all.
You argue like a North Korean arms negotiator - vigorously from a position of weakness.
an ill wind that blows no good
Which community was quick at embracing the WEB when Al Gore created it?
The Adult industry..
Which community use the most of the WEB as we speak?
The Adult industry..
Which community has the most apeal to the common techy/nerdy crowd of today $lazy selfconciensious teannager?
The Meat Your Match Only For a Quick Fantasy/Laid and share it with the world ala MySpace, Hi5...
WEB 2.0 will be built on community based phenomenon. And guess what, the OSS crowd was doing it, was enjoying it WAY before mass media pickted it up.
WEB 2.0 is nothing new. Its just a term invented by "thinker" for the unwashed mass.
Just like "World Wide Web" came about.
Wash, Rince, Repeat..
Regards,
Akoma
assert(expired(knowldege)); core dump
I don't know if you are a troll, an X fanboy, or you just plain didn't think it through, but I would suggest in the future that you argue on matters that you actually know something about and have thought through a little more. Thanks for your time.
It is not trolling to express a serious point, even though it challenges your views. The original post suggested that the client server model used by tty programs is not conceptually different from web programs in a cleint server sense. My reply (modded up I might add) suggested that X also followed the same model, and offered a universe of capability over the broken, confused, shity web 2.0 "technologies" we see today. It is a valid and insightful observation. So the web programing fanboys came out of the woodwork to defend the disfunctional status quo. I read much about the minutae of HTTP extensions and justification of slow, uninteractive web pages and bloated frameworks. I don't believe that you can abstract concepts from diverse systems deeply enough to formulate a judgement. Perhaps you don't have experience with many. Get some before your start foaming at the mouth. If you don't like trolling maybe you should do less of it yourself. I hope you find happier reading elsewhere on the site. There is a Simpsons story today that you might like.
an ill wind that blows no good
Of course, Microsoft and IBM have had researchers and, indeed, research groups studying social computing since the mid-1990s.
They've known for at least a decade that these were important areas to study. TFA should know better.
Dammit, and I just finished downloading Web 1.9!
Anyone got a torrent?
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
Thank God for the WWW and the death of traditional client/server and X-based client/server. Without the web we'd be mired in X bugs again up to our elbows.
- a veteran of 20 years of X bugs
"Web 2.0" ..... hmmmmm ......
Is that the brand new,shiny piece of crap he's using to host his blog that insists that IT knows how wide the article shold be instead of adjusting itself to the size of my browser window?
Until the pontificating wanker can show even basic web design competence, I don't think I'm going to bother reading the article.
from http://geek2.wordpress.com/:
Web 2.0
On April 1st, 2004, Google launched GMail, which went on to ignite the whole Web 2.0 / AJAX revolution which we are witnessing right now. There is no agreed definition of Web 2.0. I like to think of it as the re-birth or second-coming of the web. The Web 2.0 websites are more like web applications, and have a rich, highly interactive and generally well designed user interface. They could also be using web services offered by other sites (for eg, Google Maps, Flickr photo web service, etc). Syndication and community are also associated with a site being Web 2.0. AJAX is the technical term which is responsible for the increased interactiveness of Web 2.0 websites. But the fundamentals remain the same - what's under the hood of a Web 2.0 application is as important as it was a few years ago.