Reaction: The Death of “Web 2.0″
I was thrilled this morning to see a post on TechCrunch about The Death of “Web 2.0“. The death here is of the term, hence the quotes, as opposed to the death of everything we take this term to mean. As you can tell by the sarcastic name of this blog, I hate the term. I hate it for various, mostly pedantic reasons.
You can probably guess at most of my pedantic objections to the term, (when did web 1.9 come out? etc.. ), so I’ll save you that monologue. Instead I think I’ll list some other terms I dislike. In most cases it’s the usage of the term that frustrates me, rather than the word itself… poor old word.
“Widget”
A word to describe something that is somewhat indescribable is never going to be helpful.
Now, don’t get me wrong! I don’t expect Facebook to write phrases like “Install this embeddable Flash application with viral sharing hooks“. I do understand the marketing requirement for packaging concepts into simple terms like “App” (which is one I like). But when industry professionals sit round a table and discuss projects, is it too much to ask that we use terms that describe what we are actually going to do when we leave the meeting room.
Here’s some other great synonyms for widget we could use in the future, perhaps when “web 3″ is released: contraption, doodad, doohickey, gizmo, thingamabob, thingamajig, whatchamacallit.
See also beer widget.
Apparently Doofer (television remote control,UK) is not yet in the dictionary. It really should be.
“Ajax”
I don’t really hate the term, but it massively abused in marketing circles.
As a developer I obviously regard it as an acronym (AJAX), but I do accept that it has become more of a word and I’m fine with that. The acronym is not entirely accurate anyway: It doesn’t have to be Asynchronous, although it usually is. It does not have to use XML; JSON is probably more popular nowadays.
However, the term should only ever be used when a JavaScript application is making background HTTP requests. But cool boxes opening and closing, or text fading in? This is not necessarily Ajax – It’s just Dynamic HTML. If you’re going to brief a developer you need to both understand what it is you’re talking about.
“Social networking site”
Recently a brief came to us at Public with this word written on the first line. We fairly quickly deciphered that they really only wanted a “community site”. A very big difference, especially in £s.
“Social media”
Actually I don’t have a problem with this term, but my brother does, so this entry is for him.
Why do I care?
I may be pedantic, but I also have a rational argument and there is definitely middle ground between feckless buzz-words, and convoluted tech speak. I also believe that, particularly in a professional environment, terminology is very important – As long as every one is on the same page, that’s fine; but how do you know they are? Assumptions lead to bad communications, which lead to messy projects, which lead to missed deadlines and late nights.
I nearly added “Blogosphere”, “Twittersphere”, actually anything ending in “sphere” pretty much annoys me, but these terms aren’t really misleading, so I left them out.
Very well put, that’s a good selection of terms and I couldn’t agree more on each one of your points.
…but are you sure you’re not just worried that with the death of “web 2.0″ you’ll have to resort to buying a new domain?
more worried that people think I’m a tw@t actually. I can cope with the £10/year cost.
The real problem is words in general. But they’re all we’ve got to satisfy our need for thingyness.
As Richard Dawkins says: A thing is a collection of particles that stay together long enough to deserve a name. And we need names. Without names our heads would explode.
The problem with names is that they are only satisfactory temporarily. But they stick around after their useful period. In the meantime we have conversations like this and wait for a new name to make more sense. It’s a problem I don’t think will ever go away because words will always be more lumbering that social and technological change.
As an aside, I think people use the term web 2.0 as a reference to a certain vernacular. shiny big buttons and friendly type etc. We’re lazy and visual proxies are the laziest way of describing anything.
And ’social media’. Well my real problem is turning what essentially is an infinite pot of new behaviours into what sounds like a channel. “Shall we do some social media stuff?” It’s a simplification that clouds the possibilities of the very idea we’re trying to describe. The exciting part of ’social media’ is that there is a total meltdown of channels and we can finally devise ways to connect and collaborate globally in ways that we have done in person for thousands of years.
I suppose it’s the ultimate paradox of human’s need for ‘things’ – that we should deny ourselves the ocean because of our love for taps.
that sounded a bit pretentious but I can’t be bothered to rewrite any of it.
anyway.
“television”.. good word, stuck around, makes sense, makes it a thing.
If it was invented in today’s economy, what would it be called? Not television, that’s for sure.
well ‘television’ made sense because the technology stayed the same for a long time. Now moving images are distributable, projectable, mashable; can appear anywhere in any form..
call something a ‘player’. the next minute it’s not being played, it’s being edited. then it’s being repurposed. all, potentially in a similar ‘window’. is a movie still a movie when it’s embedded into a live gaming experience which is also a billboard? or is it an ad? or is it a game? what about when the content isn’t pre-recorded but is created live by people in different countries. what if its housing changes form and location?….
terms and semiotics often stay valid when they cease to be accurate
- The play arrow ‘>’ applies to the direction of a tape.
- Digital cameras even fake a shutter sound.
haha – i can’t even tell if you’re arguing with me.
not arguing at all. Just saying that legacy isn’t a problem.
Language is made of legacy, that’s what makes it so interesting.