Web 2.0 – Is The Machine Using Me?

This week I have been looking at Web 2.0 and trying to answer the question ‘Is the machine using me?’

My initial reaction, as with almost everyone’s was ‘No, or course not.’ It was hard to imagine how the internet could be using me, I used it when, where and however I wanted to use it, I had always thought about it being on my terms. In theory I was in control of the machine, but is the reality?

As with every week, I can’t go any further without some explanation. Web 2.0 – what is it? 

Webopedia tells me it is “the term given to describe a second generation of World Wide Web that is focused on the ability for people to collaborate and share information online. Web 2.0 basically refers to the transition from static HTML Web pages to a more dynamic Web that is more organised and is based on serving Web application to users. Other important functionality of Web 2.0 includes open communication with an emphasis on Web-based communities of users, and more open sharing of information. Over time Web 2.0 has been used more as a marketing term than a computer-science-based term. Blogs, wikis and Web services are all seen as components of Web 2.0.”

But there is a lot of jargon in there so simply Web 2.0 can be described as the ‘social’ World Wide Web, a place where virtually anyone can upload and share information, knowledge and experiences.

This picture was taken from David Gauntlett's Making is Connecting and I think is a simple and effective diagram to explain Web 2.0, it shows how Web 2.0 is more social, more connected and more communal. 

Cyberjournalist.net has said the 50 millionth blog was tracked in July 2006 and the ‘blogosphere’ is doubling roughly every six and a half months. So six years later that 50 million will have doubled twelve times! They also said there are more than two new blogs created every second and an average of 1.6 million postings a day.

But a common misconception is that blogs are not simply text, YouTube is a video blogging site, Flickr is a photo blogging site, Tumblr is a text, video and photo blogging site. All of these websites rely on users to upload information and content. Without content they would not survive, without readers and viewers they would not survive.

Web 2.0 needs all of us. Web 2.0 is all of us.

So I don’t think the machine is using me, I think there are certain things the machine could not do without me, and certainly I have realised it wasn't all as black and white as I first thought. But without Web 2.0 I wouldn't be able to do many things on the internet that I can now.

I think we get as much from Web 2.0 as we put in. A 19-year-old student who regularly uses Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr or Flickr is going to be putting more into, and getting more out of, ‘the machine’ than a 70-year-old grandma who has only just learnt how to send an e-mail. 

Web 2.0 has changed how we communicate, how we learn, how we evolve. Web 2.0 has changed us.

Michael Wesch, assistant professor of cultural anthropology at Kansas State University and keen YouTuber, created an animation explaining Web 2.0 answering many questions about what it is, how it works and what role we play within it. If you have 5 minutes to spare it really is a must-watch (just turn your speakers down the 80’s video game music does tire after a while!)

Websites I used whilst researching are all mentioned in the blog and links can be found here:

·         http://www.cyberjournalist.net/news/003674.php