Bat Crap of Web Evolution

Posted

Is 2012 going to give us Web 5? While we see the next evolution of the web, others are still trying to catch up and be relevant in Web 2, let alone Web 3. Wait, was there a Web 4? Gah!? What the heck people?!

Well, to be fair… there is no “official label” that is assigned by an official committee. There is only talk about such evolution online and in nerd herds I associate with.

In a recent conversation, I realized the core of this evolution is the byproduct of the previous evolutionary phase. Or what I have recently began calling the “guano” of the web.

What’s guano? Well, profitable [bat] crap, of course!

Let me step back…

This is how I define the evolution of the web: I see business models fitting into each phase of the evolution and – depending on the phase – there are specific measurements of success associated with each evolutionary web step.

I often refer to Web 1 as the Dewey decibel system of the web. Indexable by keyword, author, and subject. Think Altavista, Webcrawler, Yahoo Directory, and even Dogpile as businesses that fit in this space. I would consider email technology short of automated marketing to also be categorized as Web 1 – broadcast and search. Success in this space is use of product. Metrics of success in businesses under Web 1 are defined by user experience around the curation and display of data as a service as well as the use of transition of data peer to peer. Early social products are around bulletin boards, forums, IRC, and peer to peer networks (file sharing.)

Algorithms in discovery evolved within search and the mass adoption of user generated content (social web) gave us Web 2.0; the ability to connect. With Web 2.0 we can see the transformation of search to include sentiment, reviews, and networks of trusts. MSN’s Bing becomes the “decision engine” and consumers begin to adapt to the decision making process and how community, networks of trusts, and online conversations around brands impact discovery and information consumption. From Friendster to Facebook and Twitter to Tumblr, social networks evolved around inter-connectivity of communities. The programmable web via the API gave us the ability to harness the byproduct of social content into products themselves. Example; a review of a service or business on Yelp populating as a “Check-in” on Twitter, a review on Facebook, and a curated search result on Google.

I recently referred to this as the Guano Effect of the Web. Attract a community of bats that call a place home, and then guano farmers will flock to harvest the byproduct of that bat community; their crap. They found many of uses for it and have built businesses to harvest this crap. Therefore, the programmable web is akin to bat crap! Semantic data is the guano of the web.

Most agree with these labels. It’s the labels past Web 2 that are subject to debate often online.

The frequency of which user generated content is produced from Web 2 technologies give us many options of how to harness that data. The fact that any new discipline created in this space is derivative of the latest and greatest tech and business models that were just put forth into the market place allows for massive research and development. Lots of “testing” and the market place learns from these tests. From 2005 to 2009, many “social” businesses were created. Success in this space is defined as adoption, connections, and the ability to build experience off of a social graph. Example, open API, Open Graph, Apple’s “App Store,” etc. Many Web 2 technologies are still launching today. But 2009 was the birth of Web 3.

In 2009 two businesses launched that defined the Web 3 world. We saw the launch of Qwiki and Wolfram Alpha. Search engines harnessing semantic data. Searchable, indexable, with sentiment, relevance, and contextualizes the data with human behavioral algorithms. Two years later, these businesses are still grasping for adoption and relevance in the online consumer. Those of us who live and breath this, love that they are forging ahead with this as the market space learns from their success and/or failers.

This phase is in its infancy still yet with massive adoption and more and more web guano being made, many are finding new uses and adapting technology to fit consumer use.

Many have started defining Web 4 as the automation of this semantic data. To put artificial intelligence behind the social cloud and harnessing the lessons learned in algorithms like Wolfram and Qwiki. Some have even started to label this automation and “software intelligence” and Web 4. Many have said this Web 4 now has a voice, and a name. Her name is Siri, and her father is Apple.

Is Siri Web 4? Is there a next step in this path to Web 5? Is Web 5 true artificial intelligence with proactive curation and the ability to broadcast to your electronic portals to the web? Is semantic data the new gold rush? I think we know that it is for many. Is the web really headed to harvesting social data as the product? We have opted into behavior that gives birth to millions of dollars being made off our content.

I am ok with that. In fact, I love collecting the web guano and finding awesome world solutions to connecting people. To me, guano is gold, man!

 

 

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta
  • http://twitter.com/krysVS Krys VanSlyke (VS)

    So is the other part of web 4 automated content creation (and spinning)?

    Everyone will have to become their own personal Blade Runner, testing content for its robot-ness.

  • http://kevinspidel.com kspidel

    In a way, yes. But algorithms of spinning and association based on human decision, much like Siri. Wasn’t sure if this would offend people, or people have fun with it. Thanks for playing!

  • http://www.realtea.net Gammydodger

    Data is indeed the new gold… as soon as it is semantified, it has come to the surface to be found. Been thinking about this myself right about now: http://www.realtea.net/data_alchemy – how certain organizations have been able to realize the value of their data, then build a model where they can guarantee that stream of data.