What is Web 2.0? Is it groupthink, a mindset, a paradigm, or a meme? Is it just some fluff or is it really hot stuff? Is it an IT-Bubble or is it the Hubble? As you know the Hubble Space Telescope is positioned outside the Earth’s atmosphere which allows it to take sharp optical images of objects in the distant space. At first everyone thought is was a bubble since one of the lenses was wrongly grinded. But against all odds the NASA technicians finally managed to switch the male functioning lens, and suddenly the astronomers were looking into a “new” space, sharp and crisp and with wonderfully displayed details.

The Web 2.0 discussion is, of course, about semiotics. A group of people decided to call certain aspects of technology and life Web 2.0. The reason was that they saw a fundamental change in web technology and web thinking recent times, beginning from the second half of 2004. They started a session to map out common features of that change. Most of these features already had a name like “collective intelligence” or Ajax. To be able to talk about these features as a group they had to give this group – or set or bundle of words – an superordinate term, a term, which did not already meant something else, a term that is strong enough to harbour the quite forceful subordinate terms. The word they choose connoted both to the software industry with their release versions and to the paradigm thought. The paradigm thought is conjured from a historical line of thinking, building on the thoughts of stages in development. Since they thought this was a new stage in the development of the Web they called it Web 2.0. Since then the concept has grown enormously. The reason for that growth is probably quite complex but would include the fact that we need bundled concepts to describe the time we live in. We cannot think without bundled concepts. The Web 2.0 word is quite neutral. It does not have a long history filled with lurking connotations.

I think it works and I would call it a meme. A meme is a piece of information which is transferred from person to person and develops in an evolution-like manner.

As with most technology related phenomena there are both possibilities and problems with Web 2.0. The possibilities and merits are:

• Collaborative Hybrid Intelligence, breaking down the embodiment walls between people, and the binary between human and technology.
• Native Web solutions might be the only way to solve the problems with digital copyright. The entity causing the problem is the “file”. Files might be obsolete in a late Web 2.0 era where information doesn’t need to be outside the Web information layer. (Of course, this requires a good broad band connection, and that will probably exclude many people for a long time. In that way this is also a problem)
• Connectivity and the long tail thought can work counter to monopoly. Services and widgets talking to each other via standard protocols and open/semi open APIs might reinforce decentralization and anti-monopoly in the digital world. Many small services connected with mashups or widgets might be as good as or better than the big beasts of today.
• Cutting off the application layer will have a profound impact on business models. If the operative system is degraded to be a communication layer between hardware and the “door” to the Web, then we probably will have a greater variety of “Web Windows”. Windows, Linux and Mac could be followed of many operative systems.

There are problems too. One problem is that some people might have hard to adopt and make use of this new environment. This is the same problem we have today and it is not related to Web 2.0 or the native web, though this is a profound problem with all (new) technology. The most evident problem related directly to Web 2.0 thinking, is about security and privacy.

PC applications were identified by location. If PC applications were in mine computer, they were mine. Web services needs registration and registration leaves traces. Traces can always be followed and follow traces is particularly easy in the digital world. The whole idea with participation and collective intelligence builds on those traces so every effort to lesser the traces for security reasons will inevitably lead to container thinking. The question about privacy and security will therefore have to be solved on the terms of Web 2.0. We cannot solve Web 2.0 problems by falling back to Web 1.0 thinking. One the few proposals to the privacy/security problem are called Identity 2.0.