While attending the Seoul Digital Forum, Google CEO Eric Schmidt was asked to define Web 3.0 by a member of the audience. He said after having seen Web 2.0 based on Ajax, Web 3.0 would probably be “applications that are pieced together” from small bits, functional on any platform (PC or mobile), with data in the cloud, and applications that are very fast and highly customizable, and are available for distribution virally through social networks and email.

While his interpretation of Web 2.0, which he calls a “marketing term”, is somewhat simplistic, his vision of the next evolution of the Web (let’s call it Web 3.0), is right on the spot. With recent developments, especially in the social networking arena, it seems that the kind of applications Schmidt is talking about are already emerging (Facebook applications), although these applications for now reside behind a fence, most probably because their development is still in quite an immature stage, so with time I expect these applications to reach a standardized form and hit the open community in a much larger scale.

I must react, though, and say that we cannot look at the evolution of the Web simply from the technical point of view. Web 2.0 has only touched the social dimension through technical advancements opening new doors and making social interaction on the Web possible on a whole new level. Web 3.0 would than have to be not only a technical improvement, such as those mentioned earlier, but also a major social improvement - even more control to the people, better social interaction models, improved online privacy and safety. Would you add anything to the list? Leave a comment.

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I found this via Read/Write Web .

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