Web 2.0

The New Internet generation

Conference

2007November

Avi Rosenthal

Strategic Technologies Consultant

Presentation Goals

Understanding what Web 2.0 is

Understanding the concepts and architecture

experiencing Web 2.0 by examples

The Domino Fall Down Video slide shows a typical YouTube screen including:

The video was created by FlippyCat, probably an amateur and not a media expert. Statistical information about FlippyCatOptions for the viewer e.g. adding to PlayList, downloading etc.Flagging option in case of improper content or a content violating Copyrights. Flag is an alert for YouTube to delete the content.

The YouTube site could be perceived as a stage for every amateur to create multimedia content. It could be compared to a Star was Born style TV programs. The participants in these programs are non professionals performing publicly. The differences: internet communities are larger than TV audience and the content is accessible anytime.

I choose deliberately a video on collapsing (Domino Fall Down) by search engine available in YouTube. The reason for choosing a video clip on that topic will be revealed in one of the next slides.

The previous video does not look like an amateur uploading content for a community.

It looks like a political initiative by Obama's headquarter and not an innocent supporter publishing her political view. It is not the only political video. The next slide includes the URL for Hillary Clintons response to Obama Girl song. Videos of politician presenting their views are available in YouTube as well. The point is that politicians think that YouTube is a valid channel for persuading voters to support them. For the younger generation the Web may be the most effective channel.

The forth video is neither an amateur post and nor a political post.

This is one of a group of real training films (black and white) during World War II.

The purpose of these films was to explain to people how to protect themselves against the unknown atomic bomb. Ridiculously, the protection method was duck and cover. We should remember that no atomic bomb was yet available. This specific film was designed for children.

This is an example of a video post that may have historical value.

Collapse (Fall down)

The year is 2001

DotCOM

Collapsed

Time perspective of The Fall down of 2001

Not all DotCom companies collapsed

Ebay, Amazon, Google, Ariba, CommerceOne,

Long Term: Internet use increased

In a brainstorm OReilly experts created the term

Web 2.0

Google 1998

. : .

Oreilly MediaLive.

Dale Dougherty VP Oreilly .

Oreilly , ,

The companies appearing in green were not harmed significantly by the DotCom collapse.

For example, Google was established in 1998 and still succeeding.

The companies appearing in red were harmed significantly by the DotCom collapse.

Oreilly is a company which publish books and e-books and organizes conferences.

The participants in this brainstorm were Oreilly experts (including Dale Dougherty the creator of this term) and MediaLive employees.

Key brainstorming questions

What is the common denominator to the DotCom survivor?

What differentiate between the companies which survived 2001 DotCom fall down and the others?

Is the 2001 crisis a sign for a new Internet generation? (technologically and culturally)

Previous example of a new generation: The change from hardware centered IT to Software centered IT in the 198X posed a huge challenge to the hardware companies like IBM, HP and Digital. Digital did not survive and after selling lines of products to other companies was finally acquired by Compaq.

Google 1998

. : .

Oreilly MediaLive.

NetScape

Webtop instead of Desktop

The leading browser of the nineties (199x)

The browser was a commercial products

control of browser APIs

Browser market control as a basis for marketing and selling other software products.

Why this model failed?

Microsoft

The Browser turned into a commodity

Focus on layers above the browser infrastructure

Netscape Web 1.0.

Dot COM

Netscape is the representative case of Web 1.0 companies.

Its business model is similar to business models of non-Web infrastructure software companies. The company was acquired by AOL prior to the DotCom collapse of 2001.

The following slides presents the classical representative of Web 2.0: Google. The differences between their model and the classical software vendors model as well as Netscape model can be found easily.

Web as a Platform

Applications and Data interconnected

Applications value dependents upon the dynamic data

Services and not software products

Do not use model of payments for software products usage

Permanent Beta - no versions

Leveraging the Search engine service as a central portal for other services

Open Social API initiative

Innovative search algorithm: Page Rank

Page Rank is a Recursive Mathematical Algorithm developed by Larry Page as a student in Stanford University. The idea is to assign rank to a page during a search. The rank is based on weighted index. The index take into account two factors: the number of references to that page and importance.

.

Social API is a new initiative by Google for common API accessing Social Networks and communities sites.

MySpace, Linkidn, Bebo, Plaxo and Orkut joined to Google.

Non dedicated Web 2.0 vendors Oracle and Saleforce.com also joined.

Blog service as an example

A user creates content in Blogger site

Free Hosting services and tools for creating and formatting a Blog supplied by Google

Pages in Google services includes logo and information about Adsense service for advertisement publishing in the Blog.

Win-Win: Google and Blogger receive money advertisers advertisement

Critical success factors: Googles ability to direct relevant advertisement, (clicks on advertisements as well as buying activity by readers) Bloggers ability to attract readers.

Problems: inappropriate content (e.g. Phorno) and clicks on advertisements by the blogger and his friends (The prevailing method of payment is based upon the number of clicks on advertisements).

The Advertisement and the content are dynamic

Web 2.0 Oreilly Map

Web 2.0 Oreilly . :

. Web 2.0 . Web 2.0

.

The previous slide depicts the Meme map build in Oreillys brainstorming.

This is the first and original Web 2.0 Meme map.

It should be noted that the model is a developing model with no explicit boundaries.

The central part includes the gravitational elements which are definitely the core of Web 2.0

The lower part in near to purple color includes principles, ideas and concepts.

The upper part (dark green) includes services examples and principles related specifically to some of them.

The next slide shows another Meme Map. I would not analyze this specific Meme Map. The purpose of inclusion of that map is to illustrate that there are many models and Oreillys model is not the only model.

The multitude of models together with the flexible boundaries enables many vendors to label their services and products as Web 2.0, although in some cases they are very far from the Web 2.0 model.

Another Meme Map

. Memo Maps, , .

Web 2.0 characteristics

Uncontrolled standards based platform

Social Computing

Sharing Communities

Sharing ethics is build in

The Hyperlinks are the Network

The user controls his data

Multimedia

Mashups

Long tail

Mashups

The origin of Mashups is in Music : Creating a new song by combining songs.

Mashups are applications build by non IT Professionals

The User assembles and links services to create an application

The services could be data services or could include Business logic functionality

The user publish the application in the Web so other users may use it or expand it.

Technology: HTML APIs XML and simple Web Services

By using JavaScript or other scripting languages the API enables connecting applications or services.

The usage of mapping application especially Google Maps as a basic service for a Mashup is very common.

To the mapping service the user adds other information such as: whether casting, banking services, restaurant, apartments for rent or for sale etc. or locations for hobbies (see next slide), traveling: flights, cars to rent and landscapes

Mashups in action

site which includes information and usage statistics about Mashups

http://www.programmableweb.com/apis/directory/1?sort=mashups

http://www.mashupfeed.com/

http://www.programmableweb.com/mashup/1001-secret-fishing-holes

Long Tail

The Web is the sum of all sites not only the sum of most popular sites

It is not based upon a principle of reproduced or clowned product

It is based upon services which may be used for many different purposes and will be bundled with other services in a Loosely Coupled style.

This principle enables implementation of a better advertising model by Google (Adsense) and Yahoo(Overtune)

eBays model of large number of small transactions utilizes the same principle

Characters in Virtual Worlds

Not all Wishes are fulfilled

Solution: Acquire a virtual identity which may fulfill your dreams

Avatar

in Hindu philosophy and religion (and as defined here too), an avatar is the physical incarnation of the Supreme (or an aspect thereof). "It derives from the Sanskrit word daveed which means "descent" and usually implies a deliberate descent into lower realms of existence for special purposes

In virtual worlds the Avatar is 3D representation of a human being (or is his Alter Ego)

Virtual Worlds

Virtual World is computerized simulation to which Real World laws apply (e.g. Time, Gravitation etc.)

Participation is by using an Avatar

Avatars communication with other Avatars is by text, sound and motion (gestures)

Second Life

Entropia Universe

Single Player Games Sims

Multiple Players Games World of Warcraft

massively multiplayer online role playing games (MMORPG).

Some experts classify Virtual Realities as MMORPG.

Real World and Virtual Worlds

VW1

VW2

VW3

VW4

Real

World

Entropia Universe

A Virtual World created by the Swedish company MindArk

A space colony build of islands

640,000 registered users (probably not logged on concurrently)

Participants role is colony development

Local animals (very different from Real World animals)

Variety of minerals

virtual Crimes

Entropia Universe - Economic

Local currency: PED - Project Entropia Dollars

Exchange rate 10 PED 1 USD

Turnover of 3.6 Billion PED in 2006

Real World Banks opened Virtual banks in Entropia Universe

Trading and Business initiatives

Mike Everest earned 35,000 USD(350,000 PED converted to USDs) operating his Avatar

Weapons are rare and expensive

Second life

Created by Linden Labs

Metaverse

Currency: Linden. Floating Rates

10 millions registered users

Moving: Walking, Running, Flying, Driving a vehicle

Communication: Text, Voice, IM

Residents building objects

Metaverse The term metaverse comes from Neal Stephensons 1992 novel Snow Crash, and is now widely used to describe the vision behind current work on fully immersive 3D virtual spaces. These are environments where humans interact (as avatars) with each other (socially and economically) and with software agents in a cyber space, that uses the metaphor of the real world, but without its physical limitations Wikipedia.

One person can formally use more than one Avatar.

IM (Instant Messaging) enables an Avatar to send a message to a group of Avatars

Second life business& Culture

Virtual lands acquisition

Virtual arts and museums Louvre

Concerts performed by real artists

Software & Hardware vendors presenting their real world products

Embassies of Real Countries

-

. ""

.

.

.. Second Life. Avatars . Avatar . : Grady Bootch

. .

Second life - technology

Thousands of Linux servers

MySQL database (34 TB)

Havock software (3rd party) for 3D manipulations on avatars and objects

Installed Client component : Windows Linux, MacOS

Applicative software for building objects (Linden Lab)

LSL scripting language enabling Avatars movement

LSL Linden Scripting Language

LSL . , . (texture).

, LSL Scripts .

LSL .

Linden Mono . Mono ( 1000) .

SecondLife
Considerations & Challenges

Local Crime

Improper Content

Pornography

Biases in favor of large companies. Residents get less and pay more.

http://secondlife.com/

.

The Virtual Grid

Avatars crossing boundaries of Virtual Words

Similar to citizens of a real country crossing a boarder to another country

Will eliminate the necessity to create multi Avatars for one real human being

New initiative of IBM & Linden Labs

Initiative of 3D Internet standards

IBM Cisco, Google, Linden Lab, Sony, Intel, Multiverse, Microsoft, Motorola, Linden Labs, Philips, Academic reaserchers

Wikipedia

Web 1.0: An encyclopedia is loaded into a Web site

Wiki origin is Hawaiian language. Its meaning is quick.

In the Web: Wiki is software enabling any user to easily and quickly create edit and link Web pages

Open Source project (It is really more about content than about source code)

Communities: adding content, discussing content etc.

Multilingual: English, German, Spanish, Japanese, French, Arabic, Hebrew, Yiddish, Indonesian, Africanas, Esperanto ,

Technological Infrastructure: Database, Editing and Restoration mechanisms, Search Engine, Hyperlink usage

Links Hierarchy: Internal, inter Wikipedia (cross languages), external

The dynamic nature is the advantage of Wikipedia in comparison to traditional encyclopedias.

http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki

Wikipedia - Challenges

Copyrights protection audits, deleting content

Content usage GNU FDL

Content quality

Checked by many readers, content addition and correction

Large Variability of content quality

Systematic topics coverage

Pareto law (80-20), Time, Initiatives

Intentional content deleting or distorting

Tracing, Blocking users, Blocking writing from Open Proxy, Deletion and restoration mechanisms, asking ISPs to block a user

Responsibility for improper content Disclaimer, content checking

Biased Content due to political views and commercial companies involvement

Checking, Restoring, Deleting

GFDL GNU Free Documentation License

The dispute about the quality of the content of an open encyclopedia vs. the quality of the content of an encyclopedia written by experts is similar to the old dispute between Open Source products and commercial software product development practices (mainly Microsoft).

For example, Open Source supporters claim that their products (projects) Security is better than Close code Security, due to the number of people checking that source code. They also claim that the development team of Closed Source products is biased, so it will not be able to check its validity properly.

Microsofts supporters claim that professionals will develop more secure code than the Open Source community.

Research results do not disprove the Open Source community claims.

Blogs

Replacement of Web 1.0 personal sites

Blogs sharing a common site (Blogospheere)

Simple way for creating personal or professional log.

Tools for creating, updating and formatting a blog supplied freely by the Blogosphere owner

(RSS) Really Simple Syndication

Talkback mechanism

Advertisements as the economical model

RSS RSS . . .

Blogs

http://www.tapuz.co.il/blog/

http://www.tapuz.co.il/blog/userBlog.asp?FolderName=germaniacapta

http://avirosenthal.blogspot.com/

http://blog.hbs.edu/faculty/amcafee/index

http://mulikoppel.blogspot.com/

Social/Professional Networks

People sharing similar interests and/or historyContent: personal& professional details, Blogs Information sharingFinding again old connections informationBusiness initiativesFacebook Myspace, LInkidn No membership fees. Income by advertisement

Linkedin

Global professional network

Profiles, Jobs seeking definitions, Endorsement

Cross-sections according to employment and studies history

First degree Network people connected to each other. Creating connection requires availability of e-mail address and approval

Connection to second degree network people is by shared first degree connection

https://www.linkedin.com/home;jsessionid=CDD9E59590615AEDC68C41AAF54F54A2.app05?session.sign_in

Digg

A site for sharing content: text, video, pictures etc.

The users are the editors by ranking content

A user can digg content by single click and undigg )bury) it if he discover it is not interesting

Contents are ranked acording to the number of diggers

Finding community members with similar diggs patterns

Linking other Web 2.0 communities

Digg

A unique (so far) model for referencing any type of content

YouTube is a videos only competitor

More than 1,000,000 registered users

A button for digging

digg it

Easy to create the tag or button by copying and pasting one line of HTML code

Could be done easily by Non-IT professionals

http://digg.com/

Digg Access rate

Alexa a site rating accesses to other sites is also a Web 2.0 community. The rating is based on accesses by registered Alexa users. This method reveals contribution to the community without any content created by the community member. The only content he supplied includes identifying details enabling Alexa software to identify the user activities in other sites.

A site's ranking is based on a combined measure of reach and pageviews. Reach is determined by the number of unique Alexa users who visit a site on a given day. Pageviews are the total number of Alexa user URL requests for a site. However, multiple requests for the same URL on the same day by the same user are counted as a single pageview. The site with the highest combination of users and pageviews is ranked #1.

Digg Technology

LAMP Architecture Open Source

MySQL database

More than 100 Linux servers

Ajax

Efficiency: started operating with 3 Linux servers

Social networks - approaches

First generation: Connecting People Linkedin

Second generation: Content Centered

The model: connection by content Flicker

Viral Model: Content transmitted by people YouTube

Social News Model: Content ranked by people Digg

Web 2.0 Considerations

Content Reliability

Unreliable data posted Innocently

Discrimination between reliable and Unreliable content

Improper usage by community members

Pornography, Crime

Copyrights

Intentional biased content & Commercial use

Privacy

Support of ad-hoc applications Mashups

Enterprise 2.0

Partial Web 2.0 technologies and principles usage within an enterprise Ajax Wikis, REST

Mostly for Rich Internet Applications (RIA)

Commercial usage of Web 2.0 tools and Communities

Blogs writing and reading by corporate employees, Participation in Social Networks, Participation in Virtual Realities Communities

An example of Virtual World by a bank

http://wellsupdate.wellsfargo.com/m/p/wls/ibk/sc.asp

. .

Web 2.0 . . . , StagenCoach Island . .

IBM Second Life

The objectives of participation in Web 2.0 by commercial companies:

New advertisement channel of the business products and services

A huge number of teenagers and young people participate in Web 2.0 Social Networks. This channel could be the best channel for that purpose for those of them who do not read newspapers and watch TV.

example: IBMs island in SecondLife

Customers preferences understanding

Reading Blogs and participating in Social Networks is done for understanding potential customers needs and way of thinking.

Business related Content creation

Content added by companies employees may be related to the companies business and could be intentionally or unintentionally biased in favor of the companies products, services, goals and objectives.

The next slide illustrates a revolutionary marketing approach of Wels Fargo bank. The bank created a Virtual World called StagenCoach Island . Playing includes financial training. Marketing by creating a Virtual World is directed towards the younger generation.

Wels Fargo is not the only business entity using that marketing strategy.

WOA

Business

Services

Enterprise

Resources

Integration

Services

Data

Apps.

Business

Processes

Data

ERP

CRM

Consume

assemble

Innovate

SOA.

:

: Business processes Business Services

. ..

. : Jackbe, IBM, BEA

.

WOA: Web 2.0 & SOA

Services assembly in organizational context is similar to Mashups in social context

The difference: Governance, Management

Runtime Web 2.0 technologies usage

Ajax, Mashups, REST

SOA vision: Building SOA applications by end users assembling services

Assembling services by end users for building business applications, requires tools enabling users to build SOA applications in the way users build Mashups . Therefore these tools should support RIA technologies in the Client side.

Robust middleware (ESBs) and Service side is required to ensure Business Service Level.

New generation of tools (currently immature tools) is aimed at combining Usability and Robustness

IBM, BEA, JackBe

.

Web 3.0

The Web as a Database

The Web as a huge database with Semantic Metadata

Semantic Web, RDF

Semantic Search Engines

3D Web

RDF - A recommendation from the W3C for creating meta-data structures that define data on the Web. It is designed to provide a method for classification of data on Web sites in order to improve searching and navigation The Semantic Web is an extension of the current Web that will allow you to find, share, and combine information more easily. It relies on machine-readable information and metadata expressed in RDF.
Semantic Web project of the W3C in which automated methods based on quality metadata are envisaged to replace much human searching of the web. Relies on ontologies, XML and RDF.

Links

Hebrew Wikipedia http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki WikiIT (Hebrew) http://www.wikit.co.il/

Blogs site https://www.blogger.com/start

Second life http://secondlife.com/

http://www.mashupfeed.com/ Mashup Feed

Digg http://digg.com/

My Blog http://avirosenthal.blogspot.com/

Q & A