Web 3.0? Are they kidding?

Nope, some of them are at least half serious. Most people I know still haven’t figured out what Web 2.0 is all about, but for a lot of the people I read, it’s getting pretty old hat, and a few of them are trying to define the next revolution already.

ReadWriteWeb asked people to come up with their own definition of what Web 3.0 means, with tickets to the O’Reilly Web 2.0 Expo on the line. My contribution was:

Web 3.0, highly abstract noun:

1. Term used by Web 2.0 startups to differentiate themselves from other Web 2.0 startups.
2. Term used by Web 2.0 pundits temporarily bored of writing about Web 2.0 startups.

I didn’t win. I probably should have made it even more snarky.

Of the winners, I really liked Robert O’Brien’s  definition. I think he’s right about the way things are heading in terms of personalised and integrated information flows. Interclue is definitely headed in that direction.  Stowe Boyd and Fred Wilson have been talking about this sort of thing for ages.

Realistically, there will be no “Web 3.0″ until O’Reilly change the name of their conference. They are the thought leaders, and despite one or two recent missteps by Tim, I can’t see them losing thought leadership anytime soon. So the question is, what would inspire them to make that change? See my list of potential factors after the cut.

Web 2.0 wasn’t so much a revolution so much as the evolution of technology, business and culture all reaching a tipping point where everything started to accelerate, and then some clever people put a name on it. Hence I think Web 3.0 won’t show until all of those things evolve even further, and perhaps another tipping point turns up.

Here are some notable trends that are likely to play their part:

Technology - Moores Law:

• Server power and bandwidth keeps getting cheaper
• Desktop power and bandwidth keeps getting cheaper
• Faster smartphones with more pixels and more memory keep popping up.

Technology - The Internet Everywhere:

• TV/Video more often than not delivered by interactive IP based clients.
• More and more devices go online (Look out for the Chumby)
• Portable pixels: ePaper, personal mini-projectors, data-glasses

Technology - The web platform evolves:

• HTML5, Offline webapps, increasing power and stability for AJAX and RIA.
• Increasing availability of AJAX & RIA widget platforms on the desktop.
• Semantic data becomes much more persuasive.
• So does the unification, personalization, and contextualization of information flows.
• Alternative interfaces become more common (think “Wii”) 

Business Factors:

• Geeks keep getting more expensive, unless there’s a glut, which is not predicted.
• More value continues to migrate onto the web.
• Google’s search dominance increases, and they start making more progress with their many non-search lines of business.
• Microsoft’s desktop dominance wanes, and the desktop in general becomes less important, but as Don Dodge points out Microsoft have so many profitable lines of business they’re definitely not going to die anytime soon.  (NB: both Paul and Don posted followups)
• Much more information available via feeds and APIs
• More monetization of feeds and APIs.
• All of the things Enterprise 2.0 guru Dion Hinchcliffe talks about keep on progressing.
• More peope working from home as gas prices increase.

Sociopolitical Factors:

• More late adopters finally figure out what this internet thing is all about.
• Web based education and learning continue to get easier.
• More and more people find out what their governments were hiding from them.
• Politics is slowly transformed by the increasing availability and use of information about the public sphere - George Soros’s “Open Society” in action.
• The new democrat in the whitehouse finally gets the US out of Iraq and the US focus goes back onto business as opposed to security. Possibly just in time to save themselves.

Obviously, that last item cannot happen before 2009 (unless they impeach both Bush and Cheny, which is highly unlikely). So my bet is that O’Reilly will change the name of the conference in 2009 or 2010. But they might change it to something other than “Web 3.0″.