Web 2.0 frenzy is producing startups like rabbits; it’s persuaded the venture capitalists to open their wallets again, and it’s even spawned its own hot-ticket conferences. But Web 2.0 is nothing like Web 1.0. Is it? Let’s compare . . . .
Web 1.0 vs. Web 2.0
There's something familiar going on here
A studied contrast.
| WEB 1.0 | WEB 2.0 |
| Annoying, self-promotional CEOs drop out of college to pursue dreams of dotcom wealth. | Same CEOs, now seven years older, drop out of Web 1.0 businesses. |
| A friend is someone who’ll gladly help you out in a bind. | A friend is someone who has spent at least 30 seconds on your MySpace page. |
Approach to naming companies: Add a “.com” to everyday words (Furniture.com, Pets.com, ReupholsterFurniture- DestroyedbyYourPets.com). |
Approach to naming companies: Add an “er” suffix, ruthlessly extract vowels, or both (Revver, Twitter, Eurekster, Flickr, Zoomr, VwlRplcr). |
| KM software attempts (unsuccessfully) to get employees to share information and learning with one another. | Corporate wikis attempt (hilariously) to get employees to share information and learning with one another. |
| Narcissistic execs track how many hits their latest memo gets on the corporate intranet. | Narcissistic execs track how many downloads their podcasts get. |
| Cross-platform miracle code that crashes browsers is called Java. | Cross-platform miracle code that crashes browsers is called Ajax. |
| Wall Street analysts inflate insubstantial companies with hype and hot air. | A-list bloggers inflate insubstantial companies with hype and hot air. |
| Big Media’s nemesis: MP3-sharing site Napster. | Big Media’s nemesis: Video-sharing site YouTube. |
| There is only one browser: Netscape. | There are many browsers, but most sites are viewable in only one of them—inevitably, not the one you’re using. |
| Enhancing your reputation involves being nice to people, accomplishing things, contributing to charity. | Enhancing your reputation involves editing your entry in Wikipedia. |
| Acronym the cognoscenti deploy to show they’re in the know: DHTML. | Acronym the cognoscenti deploy to show they’re in the know: RSS. |
| Venture capitalists finance startups that hope to earn money from advertising. | Entrepreneurs spurn venture capital financing and hope to earn money from advertising. |
| Big scary company: Microsoft. | Big scary company: Google. |
| Marketing swag: free messenger bag. | Marketing swag: free software widget. |
| Fire sale on Herman Miller Aeron chairs when companies go out of business. | Mom and Dad get their guest bedroom back when companies go out of business. |
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