(Digital Inspiration 2008)
Do you remember Web 1.0? Not long ago, web 1.0 was all about reading, companies, client-severs, HTML, home pages, taxonomies, portals, wires, ownership control, IPOs, Netscape, web forms, screen scraping, dial-up connections and hardware costs (Cong and Du 2007, 7; O’Reilly 2006; Treese 2006, 15). Web 2.0 contrasts its predecessor nowadays by being all about writing, communities, peer-to-peer relationships, social networking, blogs, XML, RSS, tags, wireless, sharing, trade sales, Google, web application, APIs, broadband and bandwidth costs (Cong and Du 2007, 8; Treese 2006, 15; O’Reilly 2006).
A key aspect of Web 2.0 is that it guides in an era of shared knowledge with no distinction between amateur, professional, consumer or expert (Cong and Du 2007, 8). The second generation of Internet primarily focuses on exploring online information and collaborative technologies such as blogs, wikis and social networking (Cong and Du 2007, 7; O’Reilly 2006). It is the evolution of the Internet into a place for communities of people to share experiences, ideas, music, video and pictures (Cong and Du 2007, 8). "The World Wide Web is being used as a platform to collaborate and share information in many new ways. Web applications are becoming a forum to discuss problems, contribute ideas, and provide solutions. These web services have become useful and popular because they enable people to connect to each other; and the benefits of this network effect grow even more powerful when more people use them," (Cong and Du 2007, 8; O’Reilly 2006). The production of ideas these days takes place in a collaborative, participatory environment which breaks down the boundaries between producers and consumers (Bruns 2007).
Web 1.0 is fairly one-sided in the collation of information online and offline, whereas web 2.0 is all about collaborating and produsage (Bruns 2007; Creamer 2008, 1). In today’s world of web 2.0, the thought of creating content is seemingly effortless to most online users. It has dramatically changed the way that people all around the world are connecting with each other. We are now sharing ideas and using our creativity for a greater good. Bruns supports this theory and argues, “user-led content creation in this new model harnesses the collected, collective intelligence of all participants, and manages— though in some cases better than in others—to direct their contributions to where they are best able to make a positive impact,” (Bruns 2007, 1).
The impact of produsage is intense for media producers because audiences often exert their new powers over them to achieve specific needs, wants and desires. A downside to creating content online is the uncertain nature of copyright and IP rights between media producers and their collaborative audience.
Collaboration and produsage is a feature of web 2.0 and will continue to be a prominent feature of web 3.0 in the future. Due to the increasing popularity and number of online communities, will offline communities completely disappear in the future? In my opinion, online communities will never fully acquire the personal, emotional and physical intimacies which are features of offline communities, however, several online communities are trying to close the gap.
References
Bruns, A. 2007. Chapter 1: Introduction: Blogs, Wikipedia, Second Life, and Beyond: From Production to Produsage. New York: Peter Lang Publishing. http://produsage.org/files/Produsage%20-%20Introduction.pdf (accessed 14 April 2008).
Creamer, M. 2008. It's web 3.0, and someone else's content is king. Advertising Age, 79 (15): 1-2.
Cong, Y. and Du, H. 2007. Welcome to the World of Web 2.0. The CPA Journal 77 (5): 6-9.
Digital Inspiration. 2008. The difference between web 1.0 and web 2.0 http://www.labnol.org/internet/favorites/the-difference-between-web-10-and-web-20/665/ (accessed 5 April 2008).
O’Reilly, T. 2006. Web 2.0 compact definition: Trying again. http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2006/12/web_20_compact.html (accessed 12 April 2008).
