There are a number of key topics that are discussed both in Web 2.0 & Web2 and in David Weinberger’s Everything is Miscellaneous. Perhaps the most apparent is the importance of “user” input; in Web 2.0/Web2 the idea is labeled “Collective intelligence” (Web 2.0 p. 2 & Web2 p. 2), basically a collective effort to create something vaster and more complicated than could be created by small number of individuals. They also list several organizations that have successfully harnessed the power of user input, among them Amazon and Wikipedia. Weinberger also touches on this concept saying rather than the “authorities” that it is the “we” that together will shape the new digital disorder. Like O’Reilly and Battelle, he mentions Amazon, discussing their implementation of customer reviews and their “Listmania” which allows users to create their own booklists (p. 59-61). Weinberger mentions Wikipedia as well (appropriately, as it is perhaps the most triumphant example of the fruits of collective intelligence), pointing out that the entirety of its amazing collection of knowledge is created and updated by anyone who wishes to (p. 100)*. This ties in to another shared concept: control, or rather giving up control. O’Reilly states that Web 2.0 is made up of cooperating data sources and encourages further cooperation, and Weinberger says that users are in control of the organization of data, which allows for more useful ways of sorting and using it (p. 93, 105).
Another common theme between Web 2.0/Web2 and Weinberger is the importance of data. Web 2.0 calls data the “next Intel Inside” saying that control of data will provide a competitive edge for businesses. Similarly, Weinberger says that “everything is metadata” in his “four new strategic principles” (p. 104). The gist of this is that data, or metadata is what drives the internet. This is the key reason that the web is so amazing; a world of knowledge at our fingertips that can be easily found and reorganized with whatever fragments (metadata) we currently possess.
Lastly, there is the niche appeal of the internet. This “long tail” is mentioned in O’Reilly’s Web 2.0, and he encourages people/businesses to “reach out to the entire web” and all of the small niches, rather than just focusing on the center. Weinberger describes this concept in his new strategic principles as “Filter on the way out, not on the way in.” He discusses how the change from paper to digital publishing allows for much more information to be put into public view (p. 102-3). He suggest that rather than having someone to filter out the “slush” that “it’s up to each reader to be filterer” and locate information that may only be interesting to themselves and a few others. When you have a multitude of niches filled with esoteric information, each person can find knowledge that is of interest to them rather than only what is deemed appropriate by “gatekeepers”.
Undoubtedly, I have left out a few other shared themes and ideas but these were the ones that I thought were the most prevalent and important. (This information filtered by Angela.)
* Apply some common sense when partaking of Wikipedia’s bounty though. After all at one point it had an article stating that sharks can shoot lasers out of their eyes, and less egregious misinformation may remain unnoticed for a while.