Web 2.0

From Wikiversity

Click here to watch the video about Web 2.0 and copyleft media (Help with Ogg video file play). This video explores Web 2.0 and copyleft licensing of media files.

the video. 4 minutes 24 seconds play time, 7.73 MB file size.

Welcome to the Wikiversity learning project for Web 2.0. Participants in the learning project explore tools for creating media such as digital audio files, video files and participating in the creation of internet content.

1 What is new about Web 2.0?
2 Activities
3 Internet content: ownership and sharing
4 Tools for digital media file creation
5 References
6 See also
7 External links

[edit] What is new about Web 2.0?

Key elements and connectivity of Web 1.0. Click image to enlarge. The early internet was characterized by slow internet connectivity (dialup) and few content creation opportunities for most internet users (content consumers).

During the 1990s, the World Wide Web provided a way for people to use a network of computers to efficiently exchange files. In general, content for the Web was created by a relatively small group of individuals or small "content development groups". Once created, the content (HTML pages and media files) was uploaded to servers and then downloaded by "content consumers" who used a web browser to display webpages. The average person was not involved with creation of Web content.

What is new about Web 2.0 is the gradual and continuing increase in technologies that allow more people to participate in Web content creation. These facilitating technologies include advances both at the level of the computer hardware available to most people and at the level of software that makes it easier for people to create Web content.

[edit] Hardware

During the past 15 years, increasing numbers of people have obtained access to computer technology and the internet. Internet data traffic passed voice data traffic at about the turn of the century and Web traffic now greatly surpasses voice data transfer^[1]. At about the same time, home internet access reached about 50% of homes in the USA. In this century, use of high-speed internet connections has increased rapidly with over 50 million U.S. residential broadband connections achieved in 2006.

[edit] Software

Web 2.0 is characterized by software that supports easy Web content creation in the form of blogs, wikis, digital media uploading websites, and new types of online social networking websites. Software advances make it easier for more people to participate as Web content creators. Websites where users are participants in Web content creation have brought an increasingly robust social nature to Web 2.0 that has built upon the spirit of simpler online communities that formed in the first decade of the World Wide Web. Another important trend influencing Web 2.0 is an increase in options for openness in the creation of software and the growing phenomenon of the Free Culture Movement.

[edit] Early software allowing computer network users to add content to servers

The first widely used type of software that allowed computer users to upload files to servers was software that allowed users to make use of computer programming languages running on mainframe computers. One of the first types of nonprogramming-related software that allowed users of computer networks to upload content of their own design was email software. Computer networks with email systems pre-dated the internet, but their use only became wide-spread in combination with the internet and the World Wide Web. See w:Web-based email.

Some of the earliest online communities grew up around "bulletin board systems". "Message board" systems that were centers of social interaction in Bulletin board systems evolved into internet forums. Some internet forums are email-based mailing lists (example) while others function independent of email or use a mixture of email and non-email-based methods for adding "posts" to the "community discussion" (example).

One of the most influential online discussion forums has been Usenet. Two serious problems for Usenet are spam and use of Usenet servers for pornography and illegal file transfers. Some Usenet groups have moderators who screen for off-topic postings. In terms of bandwidth use, most Usenet traffic is not text-based discussion, but rather digital media files such as illegally shared software, music and movies^[2]. See: w:Warez.

Internet Relay Chat (IRC) provides another example of a text-based messaging system that spawned internet-based communities pre-dating the growth of the World Wide Web in the late 1990s. With more powerful personal computers and higher speed internet connections, voice chat and video chat have become increasingly popular. Such "live" channels for communication are useful for allowing members of internet-based communities to communicate effectively and support community cohesion. See: Wikiversity:Chat.

In addition to online discussion systems (above), "Web 1.0" included a Web hosting service industry that provided users with server space for their own HTML pages and media files. Some web hosting companies attempted to develop a "community model" in which users with similar interests could "congregate" and interact online. One of the more famous examples is GeoCities. Geocities users could construct personal webpages and participate in topical discussion groups. Similar Web 2.0 websites host wikis (see wiki farm) and blogs.

[edit] Archives

While many "Web 1.0" online discussion systems featured message archive systems, the content of the online discussions was generally of transient relevance to the active participants. With the growth of the World Wide Web, some online discussion systems either made use of associated web pages or integrated into an HTML-based interface. A comprehensive approach to archiving Web content is the Internet Archive project, but many websites routinely exclude themselves from the archive. Even when an archive system exists for user-uploaded computer network content, the nature of email, online discussion forums and personal websites makes much of the content quickly dated and irrelevant.

[edit] Evolving technologies

Web 2.0 is characterized by hardware and software that facilitate internet content creation and sharing.

Blogs, wikis and media uploading websites are three examples of newer technologies that support broader participation in the process of content creation for the internet.

[edit] Blogs

Some Usenet discussion group contributors and personal website authors were among the first bloggers (see Wikipedia). Starting in the late 90s, websites and software devoted to blogging became available via the World Wide Web. In the early part of this century blogging increased in popularity and is now an integral feature of many online communities and social networking sites such as MySpace. See also blogs here at Wikiversity.

[edit] Wikis

Traditionally, the ability to edit a particular webpage is severely restricted, often to just one person. Wiki technology was first used in 1995 and introduced a simple way for many people to collaboratively edit a website's webpages. Wiki websites achieve functionality as an online community by providing user pages (where participants can describe their personal interests) and an assortment of forum and discussion pages where wiki participants ("editors") can participate in community discussions. Wikipedia was started in 2001 and became widely known by 2006, particularly among school age internet users. By mid-2007 Wikipedia had become a top 10 website and as many as 6 percent of internet users make use of Wikipedia^[3]. Many smaller wiki websites exist, some facilitated by Wiki farms, other wikis are run independently by individuals or organizations.

[edit] Media sharing websites

Due to low bandwidth connections (dialup) available in the early internet, image files were the dominant media file format during the 1990s. Digital audio for CDs and larger hard drives made audio files an increasingly popular file format during the 1990s. DVD use did not surpass video tape until 2003. Digital cameras and personal computers with optical disk drives became increasing common in the early years of this century. Image sharing websites such as Flickr and video sharing websites such as YouTube allow users to upload and share their pictures and video. Broadband internet, larger hard drives and faster CPUs in personal computers now allow more individuals to work with digital video files. Websites such as YouTube provide user interfaces that include support for text-based special-interest discussion groups as well as video blogs.

[edit] Activities

Find a Web 2.0 technology that you have not previously used (start a blog, create and upload some digital media, create an account at a wiki website or social networking website, etc) and then describe your experience on a Wikiversity page.
Participate in web content creation at a project such as Where are the Joneses. Describe your experience here.
What data exist documenting participation in blogging, wiki editing, creation and sharing of digital media?
- technorati stats 2006
- wikimetrics - a blog with some useful information

[edit] Internet content: ownership and sharing

"Web 2.0" is a term that can be used to refer to a qualitatively new and different pattern of internet behavior: a shift from an older era of restricted and expensive technologies for creation and internet-based sharing of digital media files to a new era of increasingly accessible and inexpensive technologies. As more and more people become empowered to participate on the internet as content producers, new patterns of content ownership and sharing have come into existence. The traditional model was that expensive digital content was protected by copyright, copies were sold and derivative works were possible only via rare and expensive special licensing agreements.

An alternative approach to digital media began with the Open-source software industry. Recognizing that software innovation is promoted by making software "open" to a distributed community of developers, some software developers began to experiment with new strategies for licensing software. In 2001, Wikipedia was launched with contents licensed under the GFDL and the Creative Commons licenses began to be developed. A growing Free Culture movement supports the licensing of digital media files so as to facilitate file sharing and re-use of media for the creation of new works.