15 golden rules for Web 2.0

Introduction

This article was originally designed to address the questions which were sent to me by large customers wanting to launch Web 2.0 initiatives.  Very often, these clients wanted to jump on the bandwagon, but didn't know how to do it.  They required help and guidance, even to understand the very meaning of Web 2.0.

Evaluating what should be done as part of such Web 2.0 initiatives with large organisations implies that we rethink the definition of Web 2.0 (see O'Reilly's Web 2.0 meme map to start with). An executive summary of this definition is provided hereafter. More than often, we have noticed that the main motivation for large corporations to jump on the bandwagon is to keep up with the Joneses.

In this article, we will describe the key principles and main reasons why you should or should not opt for a Web 2.0 initiative.  Large organisations are getting increasingly interested in launching 2.0 initiatives. To a certain extent, we can relate that to the fact that an increasing number of success stories are relayed by the press and that most of them are related to impressive buzz marketing operations, which are seemingly easy to replicate.  The entire world is full of the concept of Web 2.0, so the idea is often not to miss the opportunity to do something about it. All of this is very tempting and hard to resist.  However, companies should never launch 2.0 websites just for the sake of it.

Indeed, it requires a lot of forward thinking about what one is trying to achieve and how it fits in the overall strategy.  To a certain extent, what we are witnessing today with Web 2.0 is not very far from what we have witnessed in the 1990s, when large corporations wanted to launch their first websites.  More than often, the same question prevails: that is to say, is this website going to support or jeopardise my brand.

How can you tell a website is 2.0-ready?

There are several characteristics of Web 2.0, which are described hereafter:

• Human characteristics
  • Collective intelligence: this is a concept which was developed by Howard Rheingold. This concept implies that when a group is cooperating, the result of this cooperation is stronger than the sum of all the contributions from all the individuals which are part of this group.
  • The user is the producer: With Web 2.0, users are also producers not just spectators. Web 2.0 sites are definitely alien to advertising and communications. Ignoring that and pursuing the old habit of delivering pre-formatted top-down product-orientated messages would be a non-starter.
• Functional characteristics:
  • RSS: RSS is more than just a feature, it has a real functional impact on user behaviour. RSS (Real Simple Syndication) enables users to receive information without having to make any effort to collect it. The use of RSS feeds imposes that the user installs a feed reader. More and more, these the readers are integrated within the Internet browser or within the Internet toolbar (Google, Yahoo, etc.). The exponential development of RSS is at last making it possible to push information towards the user as was originally designed at the end of the 1990's.
• Technical characteristics:
  • Thin clients, light programming and mash-ups: the basic idea is that Web 2.0 websites can be built very rapidly by using existing objects or even objects and pieces of code or data drawn from existing websites. These existing websites can also be external. A typical mash-up example is that of websites which use Internet maps (mainly from Google), in order to make geo-localisation possible.
  • The Web as a platform: this is the recycling of the '€˜old' (2000+) ASP concept (Application Service Provision). The idea is to use the network as a repository, and to avoid thick clients (see previous paragraph).

  

Comments

[Adam Cox]

A good way is to learn by example. I compiled a list of many of the popular Web 2.0 sites:

Popular Web 2.0 Sites
hi5
bebo
Flixster
yourminis
Friendster
freewebs
gizmoz
YouTube
flickr
RockYou!
PICZO
Xanga
Netvibes
iGoogle
Windows Live
Pageflakes
Blogger
TypePad
Yahoo! WIDGETS
Linkedin
digg
WIKIPEDIA
del.icio.us
Bloglines
podcast.com
podcast.net
xing
tagged
Just Talk About Web
blogrush
Spottt
TrafficJam
TechCache
furl
Blink List
reddit
Feed Me Links
News Vine
orkut
Live Journal
Black Planet
MyYearBook
WordPress
Multiply
Slide
Zorpia
eBay
TagWorld
ProfileHeaven
Gigya
Plaxo
SixApart
Ning
Vox
MovableType
BoingBoing
Zune
Meebo
iMeem
PopURLs
dabble
Pandora
Twitter
EyeSpot