In 2006, Tim O’Reilly, founder of top tech publishing company O’Reilly Media, gave his compact definition of Web 2.0:

“Web 2.0 is the business revolution in the computer industry caused by the move to the internet as platform, and an attempt to understand the rules for success on that new platform. Chief among those rules is this: Build applications that harness network effects to get better the more people use them. (This is what I’ve elsewhere called “harnessing collective intelligence.”)

Now let’s compare that to what top Bloggers Dan Farber (CNET News.com), Marshall Kirkpatrick (ReadWriteWeb), Mike Butcher (TechCrunch), Dean Takahashi (VentureBeat), Scott Beale (Laughing Squid), Josh Lowensohn (Webware).

For me, Web 2.0 is multifaceted:

• Platforms and tools that increase communication, collaboration and connection
• Software built around communities
• Open platform with applications that run in the cloud
• User-generated content or data creating two-way exchange

It’s also a term of reference for the phase of evolution of the Internet in which we currently reside. Marketers like it too!

Next steps (Web 3.0) [UPDATE: Check out this post from ReadWriteWeb on Web 3.0]:

• Connect disparate communities with data portability and openID
• Platforms and tools that help sort data so users can find what they want and interface with it where and how they want it
• Build infrastructure to allow full integration of Web 2.0 aspects with traditional networks

How do you define Web 2.0? Where do you see the Internet headed in the next 5 to 10 years? Let us know in the comments.

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