Pointy Rocks and the Forces of Evil - Post #1 - Week 2

A long time ago, pointy rocks were pretty darn useful. Over time, they were improved and replaced by humans looking to get something done right. Recently, the pointy rock has evolved into a Swiss Army knife, capable of many tasks that a pointy rock just couldn’t handle. This is what happens to tools. They become more powerful over time. They don’t magically turn into self-aware intelligent organisms. Unfortunately, perceptions of the current most powerful tool – the web – are somewhat warped. In his article, Web Squared: Web 2.0 Five Years On, Tim O’Reilly and John Battelle make several rather grandiose statements about the nature of the web.

          They say that the web is a platform. I wholeheartedly agree. You build upon platforms to make them more powerful. Later on, the authors state that the web is the world. I wholeheartedly disagree. The world contains life and death, chemicals and compounds and sights and sounds. The web contains comparatively poor reproductions of some of these things in the form of digital data. The authors make the valid point that web users cast a digital shadow, and are constantly contributing to the immense pool of data that makes up the resources of the web. The authors also claim that the web has acquired intelligence and is growing with our guidance. This just is not true, and I feel sorry for the web developers that work so hard to improve the web so that we humble users may enjoy it. The web is a tool that is maintained by humans. There is no self-awareness. The evolution of the web is really just a sign of the increasing knowledge of humans. Rocks don’t grow handles and become hammers, and the web doesn’t develop online marketplaces where zillions of dollars of merchandise have been purchased and sold. For more on this rant, request it in the comments section.

          The web is said to currently be in its second stage, known as Web 2.0. According to O’Reilly and Battelle, this era will involve a race for acquisition of data. Once data has been acquired, it can be distributed for profit, and many corporations, individuals and criminals are taking advantage of this.

          Current web-based applications are largely concerned with utilizing the vast amount of user-generated data that is available to them. Thus, the applications being developed and used are made to improve as more people use them. Evidence of this can be seen in all fields of technology, from online commerce to interactive multiplayer games. The applications and websites that are being used are the ones that blur the line between users and developers. eBay is simply a virtual market, where employees act as custodians by maintaining and improving the place. Users take on the role of vendor, and can sell their goods in the market for a fee. This site would be useless without users in the same way a market would be useless without anyone selling or buying anything. It is this codependence between users and developers that defines Web 2.0.

         The current state of the web places great priority upon so-called “collective intelligence.” O’Reilly and Battelle make claims that the increase of user generated data will allow for the creation of valuable collective works that would have been impossible if not for “crowdsourcing.” The authors fail to take into account the fact that these developments don’t make the web good, they make it into a more powerful tool. Pointy rocks can hurt people. Swiss Army knives can inflict more pain on more people. In its first stage, the web was used by the forces of evil. This won’t stop with Web 2.0. The difference now is that they have greater quantities of data at their disposal, and they can work together with increased efficiency.
Isn’t that just super?

-Will