TEWM

Alluding to the version-numbers that commonly designate software upgrades, the phrase "Web 2.0" hints at an improved form of the World Wide Web; and advocates suggest that technologies such as weblogs, social bookmarking, wikis, podcasts, RSS feeds (and other forms of many-to-many publishing), social software, Web APIs, Web standards and online Web services imply a significant change in web usage.

As used by its proponents, the phrase "Web 2.0" can also refer to one or more of the following:

* The transition of websites from isolated information silos to sources of content and functionality, thus becoming computing platforms serving web applications to end-users
* A social phenomenon embracing an approach to generating and distributing Web content itself, characterized by open communication, decentralization of authority, freedom to share and re-use, and "the market as a conversation"
* Enhanced organization and categorization of content, emphasizing deeplinking
* A rise or fall in the economic value of the Web, possibly surpassing the impact of the dot-com boom of the late 1990s

Earlier users of the phrase "Web 2.0" employed it as a synonym for "Semantic Web," and indeed, the two concepts complement each other. The combination of social-networking systems such as FOAF and XFN with the development of tag-based folksonomies, delivered through blogs and wikis, sets up a basis for a semantic web environment.[citation needed]
On September 30, 2005, Tim O'Reilly wrote a piece summarizing the subject. The mind-map pictured above (constructed by Markus Angermeier on November 11, 2005) sums up the memes of Web 2.0, with example-sites and services attached.
On September 30, 2005, Tim O'Reilly wrote a piece summarizing the subject. The mind-map pictured above (constructed by Markus Angermeier on November 11, 2005) sums up the memes of Web 2.0, with example-sites and services attached.

In the opening talk of the first Web 2.0 conference, Tim O'Reilly and John Battelle summarized key principles of Web 2.0 applications:

* the web as a platform
* data as the driving force
* network effects created by an architecture of participation
* innovation in assembly of systems and sites composed by pulling together features from distributed, independent developers (a kind of "open source" development)
* lightweight business models enabled by content and service syndication
* the end of the software adoption cycle ("the perpetual beta")
* software above the level of a single device, leveraging the power of The Long Tail.
* easy to pick up by early adopters

Tim O'Reilly gave examples of companies or products that embody these principles in his description of his "four plus one" levels in the hierarchy of Web 2.0-ness: [5]

* Level 3 applications, the most "Web 2.0", which could only exist on the Internet, deriving their power from the human connections and network effects Web 2.0 makes possible, and growing in effectiveness the more people use them. O'Reilly gives as examples: eBay, craigslist, Wikipedia, del.icio.us, Skype, dodgeball, and Adsense.
* Level 2 applications, which can operate offline but which gain advantages from going online. O'Reilly cited Flickr, which benefits from its shared photo-database and from its community-generated tag database.
* Level 1 applications, also available offline but which gain features online. O'Reilly pointed to Writely (since 10 October 2006: Google Docs & Spreadsheets, offering group-editing capability online) and iTunes (because of its music-store portion).
* Level 0 applications would work as well offline. O'Reilly gave the examples of MapQuest, Yahoo! Local, and Google Maps. Mapping applications using contributions from users to advantage can rank as level 2.
* non-web applications like email, instant-messaging clients and the telephone.

Papers

MMORPGs and the Virtual Sweatshops of the Digital Empire: Mike Kent, Murdoch University, Australia

This paper looks at the hidden economic underbelly of the increasingly popular online virtual worlds. There are companies establishing real-world sweatshops designed to produce virtual goods that can be sold at vast, and very real, profits.

This paper presents research and illuminations for discussion from a study which explores the intuitive resonances between drama education, game play and rich immersive environments. In particular, it seeks to illuminate and clarify whether the affordances of virtual game worlds and those of dramatic worlds created through the structures and strategies of drama education can work together to inspire new world views.In drama education, the concept of playing and learning is exploited through development of dramatic worlds where participants draw on their actual world knowledge to create unique experiences. Virtual environments temptingly offer a third world where playing to learn might be deepened.This sub-study exploits a drama experience called ‘History’s Purchased Page’ which explores the mystery of who actually climbed Everest (an activity taken from O’Toole and Dunn, 2002, pp. 120-131). Within this experience the children take on the role of historians and game designers who are employed by a fictitious company to design interactive software that offers learning experiences around the conquering of Everest. A key learning outcome of this experience is that the participants start to problematise the nature of historical “truth” through active engagement in a dramatic world that uses web based media, images and recounts to support immersion in the event.

This feasibility stage of the study sought to understand what might happen if the “being there” of drama is combined with the “being there” of a persistent world. The research posed two key questions:

1. Would the experience be more engaging if the students were also given opportunities to enter a parallel persistent on-line world capable of generating rich visualisations of the Everest context and the chance to deepen their immersion via avatar presence and exploration opportunities – opportunities to not only “see” the Everest world but also “act” within it?

2. How does this immersion in the virtual world affect the children’s engagement in the dramatic world, especially with regard to the tensions that usually drive dramatic worlds - including the all important tension of metaxis [defined as the “the state of belonging completely and simultaneously to two different autonomous worlds” (Boal, 1995, p. 43)].

This paper will report on the initial findings of this project, focusing on dramatic tension and its relevance as a framework for understanding what happens when dramatic, virtual and actual worlds collide.

Web 2.0

Definition

Papers