What is all the Talk about Social Networking, Open Source, and Web 2.0 Technology
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by: stickystebee
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Social Networking: These are generally web sites that simplify & combine many Web 2.0 applications [see below] into a single site with networking tools built in for sharing content & interacting with other users. One of the great strengths of social networking is that it removes cues of gender, age, race, physical disability, etc. that often burden face-to-face social relations, However many social networking sites obliterate this advantage by requiring users to post such information, a system that is frequently exploited by pedophilic social parasites.
Web 2.0: In the past, the web has functioned sort of as an "information silo", with very little interaction between content providers & content users. While not a new technical standard, Web 2.0 is a phrase coined to refer to recent web applications that facilitate content creation, collaboration and sharing between users. Since these applications do not require technical web skills, this results in decentralized authority, open communication, freedom to share & reuse content. Users of Web 2.0 don't need to worry about finding & paying for a web hosting service, finding software for editing HTML & upoading files via FTP. They just sign up & create their own web presence with simple point & click tools. Web 2.0 also emphasizes the ability to track rapidly changing web content using feeds & aggregators. Interactive Web 2.0 technologies include blogs, v-logs, podcasts, wikis, forums, social bookmarking, social networking, photo sharing.
Open Source Software: Software can be downright expensive. It can be less than optimal for your needs &/or un-customizable. Some products--like Microsoft operating systems, for instance--are getting ridiculously irritating to manage, even for legitimate purchasers. And you can get in big trouble for loading your software on more computers than you have licenses. Fortunately, there are many, many free software applications available out there, especially for PCs (Macs have rather fewer options). Even many commercial software apps have a limited time or functionality version available for free. Some things I have downloaded recently & found very useful include image editing, web editing, video capture, sound editing, file format converters, FTP utilities, password crackers (for my own network machines!). Examples? Operating systems: tell Microsoft where they can stick their obnoxious, difficult Windows activation codes! There are excellent open-source versions of Linux operating systems out there, many of them absolutely free. FYI, different versions of Linux are called "distributions". These distributions are targeted at different users & some are not free. Some distributions are really technical & specific, but many are incredibly user-friendly with familiar-looking graphical user interfaces (GUIs) just like Windows, & common document formats so you can share files just like you do now. Look for a distribution targeted at your type of work, along with a good support community working on it. Office packages: even if you don't want to change operating systems, you can still use open-source office software instead of Microsoft Office Image editing: there are some free, open-source image editing software packages out there that are often as good or better than the commercial ones that cost hundreds of dollars. Gnu: is an organization that promotes the development of open-source software. Try Googling "gnu _" for whatever you need, i.e. "gnu zip utility", "gnu backgammon", etc.
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You don't have to look far to find websites adopting such methods. If none of the information given in this article clarifies what web2.0 is then visit websites such as digg.com & blogpress, which are good examples of how internet users set to benefit from this movement...
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