What Is web 2.0 Design Patterns and Business Models for the Next Generation of Software 09/30/2005 The bursting of the dot-com bubble in the fall of 2001 marked a turning point for the web. Many people concluded that the web was overhyped, when in fact bubbles and consequent shakeouts appear to be a common feature of all technological revolutions. Shakeouts ty pically mark the point at which an ascendant technology is ready to take its place at center stage. The pretenders are given the bum's rush, the real success stories show their strength, and there begins to be an understanding of what separates one from the other. The concept of"Web 2.0" began with a conference brainstorming session between O Reilly and MediaLive International. Dale Dougherty, web pioneer and o'Reilly VP, noted that far from having"", the web was more important than ever, with exciting new applications and sites popping up with surprising regularity. What's more, the companies that had survived the collapse seemed to have some things in common. Could it be that the dot-com collapse marked some kind of turning point for the web, such that a call to action such as"Web 2.0 might make sense? We agreed that it did, and so the Web 2.0 Conference was born. In the year and a half since, the term"Web 2.0 has clearly taken hold, with more than 9. 5 million citations in Google. But there's still a huge amount of disagreement about just what Web 2.0 means, with some people decrying it as a meaningless marketing buzzword, and others accepting it as the new conventional wisdom This article is an attempt to clarify just what we mean by Web 2.0. In our initial brainstorming, we formulated our sense of Web 2.0 by example: Web 1.0 Web 2.0 doubleclick Google Adsense Ofoto -- Flickr BitTorrent mp3.com > Napster Britannica Online -- Wikipedia personal websites -- blogging evite -- upcoming org and EVDB omain name speculation -- search engine optimization
What Is Web 2.0 Design Patterns and Business Models for the Next Generation of Software by Tim O'Reilly 09/30/2005 The bursting of the dot-com bubble in the fall of 2001 marked a turning point for the web. Many people concluded that the web was overhyped, when in fact bubbles and consequent shakeouts appear to be a common feature of all technological revolutions. Shakeouts typically mark the point at which an ascendant technology is ready to take its place at center stage. The pretenders are given the bum's rush, the real success stories show their strength, and there begins to be an understanding of what separates one from the other. The concept of "Web 2.0" began with a conference brainstorming session between O'Reilly and MediaLive International. Dale Dougherty, web pioneer and O'Reilly VP, noted that far from having "crashed", the web was more important than ever, with exciting new applications and sites popping up with surprising regularity. What's more, the companies that had survived the collapse seemed to have some things in common. Could it be that the dot-com collapse marked some kind of turning point for the web, such that a call to action such as "Web 2.0" might make sense? We agreed that it did, and so the Web 2.0 Conference was born. In the year and a half since, the term "Web 2.0" has clearly taken hold, with more than 9.5 million citations in Google. But there's still a huge amount of disagreement about just what Web 2.0 means, with some people decrying it as a meaningless marketing buzzword, and others accepting it as the new conventional wisdom. This article is an attempt to clarify just what we mean by Web 2.0. In our initial brainstorming, we formulated our sense of Web 2.0 by example: Web 1.0 Web 2.0 DoubleClick --> Google AdSense Ofoto --> Flickr Akamai --> BitTorrent mp3.com --> Napster Britannica Online --> Wikipedia personal websites --> blogging evite --> upcoming.org and EVDB domain name speculation --> search engine optimization
page views ost per click screen scraping web services stems wikis directories(taxonomy) tagging (" folksonomy syndication The list went on and on. But what was it that made us identify one application or approach as"Web 1.0 and another as"Web 2.0"?(The question is particularly urgent because the Web 2.0 meme has become so widespread that companies are now pasting it on as a marketing buzzword, with no real understanding of just what it means. The question is particularly difficult because many of those buzzword-addicted startups are definitely not Web 2.0, while some of the applications we identified as Web 2.0, like Napster and BitTorrent, are not even properly web applications!)We began trying to tease out the principles that are demonstrated in one way or another by the success stories of web 1.0 and by the most interesting of the new applications 1 The web as platform many important concepts, Web 2.0 doesn't have a hard bour ut rather, a gravitational core. You can lize Web 2.0 as a set of principles and practices that tie together a veritable solar system of sites that demonstrate some or all of those principles, at a varying distance from that core Web 2.0 Meme Ma dogs: Parti cipa Not publishing Bittorrent ustomer saiser Wikipedia: Rich User Exmor enabling he long Red cli Trust Tho Wob as platform User PosIoning You control your own dsta Trust your users a techno ogy 5, not packaged software Architecture of Particlpation The Long Ta Cost-effective scalable bove the level of a sInglo devce Gata as the"intel Inside Rich User Experience The perpetual beta te more peaple Hackab时ly ghiNo ome nights reserv behavor no predetermined
page views --> cost per click screen scraping --> web services publishing --> participation content management systems --> wikis directories (taxonomy) --> tagging ("folksonomy") stickiness --> syndication The list went on and on. But what was it that made us identify one application or approach as "Web 1.0" and another as "Web 2.0"? (The question is particularly urgent because the Web 2.0 meme has become so widespread that companies are now pasting it on as a marketing buzzword, with no real understanding of just what it means. The question is particularly difficult because many of those buzzword-addicted startups are definitely not Web 2.0, while some of the applications we identified as Web 2.0, like Napster and BitTorrent, are not even properly web applications!) We began trying to tease out the principles that are demonstrated in one way or another by the success stories of web 1.0 and by the most interesting of the new applications. 1. The Web As Platform Like many important concepts, Web 2.0 doesn't have a hard boundary, but rather, a gravitational core. You can visualize Web 2.0 as a set of principles and practices that tie together a veritable solar system of sites that demonstrate some or all of those principles, at a varying distance from that core
Figure 1 shows a"meme map"of Web 2.0 that was developed at a brainstorming session during FOO Camp, a conference at O'Reilly Media. It's very much a work in progress, but shows the many ideas that radiate out from the web 2.0 core For example, at the first Web 2.0 conference, in October 2004, John Battelle and I listed a preliminary set of principles in our opening talk. The first of those principles was"The web as platform. "Yet that was also a rallying cry of Web 1.0 darling Netscape, which went down in flames after a heated battle with Microsoft. What's more two of our initial Web 1.0 exemplars, DoubleClick and Akamai, were both pioneers in treating the web as a platform. People dont often think of it as"web services", but in fact, ad serving was the first widely deployed eb service, and the first widely deployed"mashup"(to use another term that has gained currency of late) Every banner ad is served as a seamless cooperation between two websites, delivering an integrated page to a reader on yet another computer. Akamai also treats the network as the platform, and at a deeper level of the stack, building a transparent caching and content delivery network that eases bandwidth congestion. Nonetheless, these pioneers provided useful contrasts because later entrants have taken their solution to the same problem even further, understanding something deeper about the nature of the new platform. Both Double Click and Akamai were Web 2.0 pioneers, yet we can also see how it's possible to realize more of the ossibilities by embracing additional Web 2.0 design pattems Let' s drill down for a moment into each of these three cases, teasing out some of the essential elements of difference Netscape vs. Google If Netscape was the standard bearer for Web 1.0, Google is most certainly the standard bearer for Web 2.0, if only because their respective IPOs were defining events for each era. So lets start with a comparison of these wo companies and their positioning Netscape framed"the web as platform" in terms of the old software paradigm: their flagship product was the web browser, a desktop application, and their strategy was to use their dominance in the browser market to establish a market for high-priced server products. Control over standards for displaying content and applications in the browser would, in theory give Netscape the kind of market power enjoyed by Microsoft in the PC market. Much like the horseless carriage framed the automobile as an extension of the familiar, Netscape promoted a"webtop"to replace the desktop and planned to populate that webtop with information updates and applets pushed to the webtop by information providers who would purchase Netscape servers. In the end, both web browsers and web servers turned out to be commodities, and value moved"up the stack to services delivered over the web platform Google, by contrast, began its life as a native web application, never sold or packaged, but delivered as a service, with customers paying, directly or indirectly, for the use of that service. None of the trappings of sale, just usage. No porting to different platforms so that customers can run the software on their equipment, just a massively scalable collection of commodity PCs running open source operating systems plus megrown applications and utilities that no one outside the company ever gets to see
Figure 1 shows a "meme map" of Web 2.0 that was developed at a brainstorming session during FOO Camp, a conference at O'Reilly Media. It's very much a work in progress, but shows the many ideas that radiate out from the Web 2.0 core. For example, at the first Web 2.0 conference, in October 2004, John Battelle and I listed a preliminary set of principles in our opening talk. The first of those principles was "The web as platform." Yet that was also a rallying cry of Web 1.0 darling Netscape, which went down in flames after a heated battle with Microsoft. What's more, two of our initial Web 1.0 exemplars, DoubleClick and Akamai, were both pioneers in treating the web as a platform. People don't often think of it as "web services", but in fact, ad serving was the first widely deployed web service, and the first widely deployed "mashup" (to use another term that has gained currency of late). Every banner ad is served as a seamless cooperation between two websites, delivering an integrated page to a reader on yet another computer. Akamai also treats the network as the platform, and at a deeper level of the stack, building a transparent caching and content delivery network that eases bandwidth congestion. Nonetheless, these pioneers provided useful contrasts because later entrants have taken their solution to the same problem even further, understanding something deeper about the nature of the new platform. Both DoubleClick and Akamai were Web 2.0 pioneers, yet we can also see how it's possible to realize more of the possibilities by embracing additional Web 2.0 design patterns. Let's drill down for a moment into each of these three cases, teasing out some of the essential elements of difference. Netscape vs. Google If Netscape was the standard bearer for Web 1.0, Google is most certainly the standard bearer for Web 2.0, if only because their respective IPOs were defining events for each era. So let's start with a comparison of these two companies and their positioning. Netscape framed "the web as platform" in terms of the old software paradigm: their flagship product was the web browser, a desktop application, and their strategy was to use their dominance in the browser market to establish a market for high-priced server products. Control over standards for displaying content and applications in the browser would, in theory, give Netscape the kind of market power enjoyed by Microsoft in the PC market. Much like the "horseless carriage" framed the automobile as an extension of the familiar, Netscape promoted a "webtop" to replace the desktop, and planned to populate that webtop with information updates and applets pushed to the webtop by information providers who would purchase Netscape servers. In the end, both web browsers and web servers turned out to be commodities, and value moved "up the stack" to services delivered over the web platform. Google, by contrast, began its life as a native web application, never sold or packaged, but delivered as a service, with customers paying, directly or indirectly, for the use of that service. None of the trappings of the old software industry are present. No scheduled software releases, just continuous improvement. No licensing or sale, just usage. No porting to different platforms so that customers can run the software on their own equipment, just a massively scalable collection of commodity PCs running open source operating systems plus homegrown applications and utilities that no one outside the company ever gets to see
At bottom, Google requires a competency that Netscape never needed: database management. Google isn't just a collection of software tools, it's a specialized database. without the data, the tools are useless; without the software, the data is unmanageable. Software licensing and control over APIs--the lever of power in the previous era--is irrelevant because the software never need be distributed but only performed, and also because without the ability to collect and manage the data, the software is of little use. In fact, the value of the softwa is proportional to the scale and dy lism of the data it he/ps to Google's service is not a server--though it is delivered by a massive collection of internet servers--nor a browser--thoug h it is experienced by the user within the browser. Nor does its flagship search service even host the content that it enables users to find. Much like a phone call, which happens not just on the phones at either end of the call, but on the network in between, Google happens in the space between browser and search engine and destination content server, as an enabler or middleman between the user and his or her online experience. While both Netscape and Google could be described as software compa nies, it's clear that Netscape belonged to the same software world as Lotus, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, and other companies that got their start in the 1980s software revolution, while Google' s fellows are other internet applications like eBay, Amazon, Napster, and yes, Doubleclick ys. Overture and Adsense Like Google, Double Click is a true child of the internet era. It harnesses software as a service, has a core competency in data management, and, as noted above, was a pioneer in web services long before web services even had a name. However, Double Click was ultimately limited by its business model. It bought into the 90s notion that the web was about publishing, not participation; that advertisers, not consumers, ought to call the shots; that size mattered, and that the internet was increasingly being dominated by the top websites as measured by Media Metrix and other web ad scoring companies. As a result, Double Click proudly cites on its website"over 2000 successful implementations" of its software. Yahoo! Search Marketing(formerly Overture)and Google Adsense, by contrast, already serve hundreds of thousands of advertisers apiece Overture and Google's success came from an understanding of what Chris Anderson refers to as"the long tail, the collective power of the small sites that make up the bulk of the web,s content. Double,s offerings require a formal sales contract, limiting their market to the few thousand largest websites. Overture and google figured out how to enable ad placement on virtually any web page. What's more, they eschewed publisher/ad-agency friendly advertising formats such as banner ads and popups in favor of minimally intrusive, context-sensitive rvice and algorith to the edges and not just the center, to the long tail an not just the head A Platform beats an Application Every Time n each of its past confrontations with rivals, Microsoft has successfully
At bottom, Google requires a competency that Netscape never needed: database management. Google isn't just a collection of software tools, it's a specialized database. Without the data, the tools are useless; without the software, the data is unmanageable. Software licensing and control over APIs--the lever of power in the previous era--is irrelevant because the software never need be distributed but only performed, and also because without the ability to collect and manage the data, the software is of little use. In fact, the value of the software is proportional to the scale and dynamism of the data it helps to manage. Google's service is not a server--though it is delivered by a massive collection of internet servers--nor a browser--though it is experienced by the user within the browser. Nor does its flagship search service even host the content that it enables users to find. Much like a phone call, which happens not just on the phones at either end of the call, but on the network in between, Google happens in the space between browser and search engine and destination content server, as an enabler or middleman between the user and his or her online experience. While both Netscape and Google could be described as software companies, it's clear that Netscape belonged to the same software world as Lotus, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, and other companies that got their start in the 1980's software revolution, while Google's fellows are other internet applications like eBay, Amazon, Napster, and yes, DoubleClick and Akamai. DoubleClick vs. Overture and AdSense Like Google, DoubleClick is a true child of the internet era. It harnesses software as a service, has a core competency in data management, and, as noted above, was a pioneer in web services long before web services even had a name. However, DoubleClick was ultimately limited by its business model. It bought into the '90s notion that the web was about publishing, not participation; that advertisers, not consumers, ought to call the shots; that size mattered, and that the internet was increasingly being dominated by the top websites as measured by MediaMetrix and other web ad scoring companies. As a result, DoubleClick proudly cites on its website "over 2000 successful implementations" of its software. Yahoo! Search Marketing (formerly Overture) and Google AdSense, by contrast, already serve hundreds of thousands of advertisers apiece. Overture and Google's success came from an understanding of what Chris Anderson refers to as "the long tail," the collective power of the small sites that make up the bulk of the web's content. DoubleClick's offerings require a formal sales contract, limiting their market to the few thousand largest websites. Overture and Google figured out how to enable ad placement on virtually any web page. What's more, they eschewed publisher/ad-agency friendly advertising formats such as banner ads and popups in favor of minimally intrusive, context-sensitive, consumer-friendly text advertising. The Web 2.0 lesson: leverage customer-self service and algorithmic data management to reach out to the entire web, to the edges and not just the center, to the long tail and not just the head. A Platform Beats an Application Every Time In each of its past confrontations with rivals, Microsoft has successfully
Not surprisingly, other web 2.0 success stories demonstrate playedthe platformcard, trumpingeven themost dominant applications this same behavior. eBay enables occasional transactions of windows allowed Microsoft to displace Lotus 1-2-3 with Excel only a few dollars between single individuals, acting as an wordPerfect with Word, and Netscape Navigator with Internet Explorer. automated intermediary Napster(though shut down for legal reasons) built its network not by building a centralized This time, though, the clash isnt between a platform and an application, song database, but by architecting a system in such a way but between two platforms, each with a radically different business that every downloader also became a server, and thus grew model: On the one side, a single software provider, whose massive the network installed base and tightly integrated operating system and APIs give contro over the programming paradigm; on the other, asystem without Akamai ys, Bittorrent an owner, tied together by a set of protocols, open standards and agreements for cooperation. Like Double Click, Akamai is optimized to do business with the head, not the tail, with the center, not the edges. While it Windows represents thepinnacle oft proprietary control via software APIs serves the benefit of the individuals at the edge of the web by Netscapetried towrestcontrol fram Mirosot using the same techniques smoothing their access to the high-demand sites at the that Mcrosoft itself had used against cher rival, and talled Bu Apache, center, it collects its revenue from those central sites which held tothe open standards of the weh has prospered. The battle s longer unequal, a platform versus a single application, but platform BitTorrent, like other pioneers in the P2P movement takes a versus platform, with the question being which platform, and more radical approach to internet decentralization. Every client is profoundly, which architecture, and which business model, is better also a server, files are broken up into fragments that can be suited to the opportunity ahead. served from multiple locations, transparently harnessing the network of downloaders to provide both bandwidth and data windows was a brilliant solution to the problems of the early PCeraIt to other users. The more popular the file, in fact, the faster it leveled the playing feld for application developers, salving a host of can be served, as there are more users providing bandwidth problems that had previously bedeviled the industry. But a single and fragments of the complete file monolithic approach, controlled by a single vendor, is no longer a solution, it's a problem. Communications-oriented systems, as the BitTorrent thus demonstrates a key Web 2.0 principle: the internet-as-platform most certainly is, require interoperability. Unlessa service automatically gets better the more people use it. vendor cancontrol bothends of every interaction, While Akamai must add servers to improve service, every lock-in via software APIs are limited BitTorrent consumer brings his own resources to the party There's an implicit "architecture of participation, a built-in Any Web 2. 0 vendor that seeks to lock in its application gains by ethic of cooperation, in which the service acts primarily as an controlling the platform will, by definition, no longer be playing to the intelligent broker, connecting the edges to each other and strengths of the platform ng the power of the users themselves. This is not to say that there are not opportunities for lock-in and 2. Harnessing Collective competitive advantage, but we believe they are not to be found via control oversoftwae API and protocols. There is a new gameafoot. The Intelligence companies that succeed in the Web 2. era wll be thasethat understan therules of that game, rather than trying togo backto the rules of the PC software era The central principle behind the success of the giants born in the Web 1.0 era who have survived to lead the Web 2.0 era appears to be this, that they have embraced the ower of the web to harness collective intelligence
Not surprisingly, other web 2.0 success stories demonstrate this same behavior. eBay enables occasional transactions of only a few dollars between single individuals, acting as an automated intermediary. Napster (though shut down for legal reasons) built its network not by building a centralized song database, but by architecting a system in such a way that every downloader also became a server, and thus grew the network. Akamai vs. BitTorrent Like DoubleClick, Akamai is optimized to do business with the head, not the tail, with the center, not the edges. While it serves the benefit of the individuals at the edge of the web by smoothing their access to the high-demand sites at the center, it collects its revenue from those central sites. BitTorrent, like other pioneers in the P2P movement, takes a radical approach to internet decentralization. Every client is also a server; files are broken up into fragments that can be served from multiple locations, transparently harnessing the network of downloaders to provide both bandwidth and data to other users. The more popular the file, in fact, the faster it can be served, as there are more users providing bandwidth and fragments of the complete file. BitTorrent thus demonstrates a key Web 2.0 principle: the service automatically gets better the more people use it. While Akamai must add servers to improve service, every BitTorrent consumer brings his own resources to the party. There's an implicit "architecture of participation", a built-in ethic of cooperation, in which the service acts primarily as an intelligent broker, connecting the edges to each other and harnessing the power of the users themselves. 2. Harnessing Collective Intelligence The central principle behind the success of the giants born in the Web 1.0 era who have survived to lead the Web 2.0 era appears to be this, that they have embraced the power of the web to harness collective intelligence: played the platform card, trumping even the most dominant applications. Windows allowed Microsoft to displace Lotus 1-2-3 with Excel, WordPerfect with Word, and Netscape Navigator with Internet Explorer. This time, though, the clash isn't between a platform and an application, but between two platforms, each with a radically different business model: On the one side, a single software provider, whose massive installed base and tightly integrated operating system and APIs give control over the programming paradigm; on the other, a system without an owner, tied together by a set of protocols, open standards and agreements for cooperation. Windows represents the pinnacle of proprietary control via software APIs. Netscape tried to wrest control from Microsoft using the same techniques that Microsoft itself had used against other rivals, and failed. But Apache, which held to the open standards of the web, has prospered. The battle is no longer unequal, a platform versus a single application, but platform versus platform, with the question being which platform, and more profoundly, which architecture, and which business model, is better suited to the opportunity ahead. Windows was a brilliant solution to the problems of the early PC era. It leveled the playing field for application developers, solving a host of problems that had previously bedeviled the industry. But a single monolithic approach, controlled by a single vendor, is no longer a solution, it's a problem. Communications-oriented systems, as the internet-as-platform most certainly is, require interoperability. Unless a vendor can control both ends of every interaction, the possibilities of user lock-in via software APIs are limited. Any Web 2.0 vendor that seeks to lock in its application gains by controlling the platform will, by definition, no longer be playing to the strengths of the platform. This is not to say that there are not opportunities for lock-in and competitive advantage, but we believe they are not to be found via control over software APIs and protocols. There is a new game afoot. The companies that succeed in the Web 2.0 era will be those that understand the rules of that game, rather than trying to go back to the rules of the PC software era