[Air-l] web 2.0 etymology

Margie Borschke margieborschke at iinet.net.au
Sun Apr 22 15:26:10 PDT 2007


Bounced...

It seems worth mentioning that "Web 2.0" can be see as spinoff of  
Esther Dyson's cleverly named technology missives from the 90s,   
Release 1.0, 2.0 etc. (significantly these titles were later bought  
by O'Reilly-see below). I haven't read these since the time but if my  
memory serves me right (and sometimes it doesn't) I believe there is  
little in the current definition of web 2.0 that Dyson didn't  
envisage even in her writings about communities circa the mid  
nineties.  Difference is we couldn't really make them happen then.  
Today, the tools to make it happen are better and easier to use,  
access is faster and more people are there to take part. So while I  
agree  that it's not an entirely new practice, I do think that some  
of those early web dreams are now being realised.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esther_Dyson

"Dyson and her company EDventure specialize in analyzing the impact  
of emerging technologies and markets on economies and societies. She  
created the following publications on technology:

     * Release 1.0, her monthly technology-industry newsletter,  
published by EDventure Holdings. Until 2006, Dyson wrote several  
issues herself and edits the others. When she left CNET, the  
newsletter was picked up by O'Reilly Media, which appointed Jimmy  
Guterman to edit it and and renamed the newsletter Release 2.0, which  
is also...
     * Release 2.0, her 1997 book on how the Internet affected  
individuals' lives. Its full title is Release 2.0: A design for  
living in the digital age. The revision Release 2.1 was published in  
1998.
     * Release 3.0, her bimonthly column for the New York Times,  
distributed via its syndicate and reprinted in Release 1.0.
     * Release 4.0, her weblog. On March 4, 2005, this weblog moved  
to Dyson's Flickr account ( http://www.flickr.com/photos/edyson/ )."




More information about the Air-L mailing list