The Internet, Web 2.0, and Beyond
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33 The Internet, Web 2.0, and Beyond Nathan Jurgenson and George Ritzer Technology changes rapidly, often transforming the social world in the process. The internet, Web 2.0 in particular, is a perfect, even an extreme, example of this fact. This chapter focuses on the changes in the last half-decade that have radically transformed the web, creating what many now describe as Web 2.0 (succeeding the largely earlier Web 1.0). This new version of the internet is defined by the explosion in user-generated content. Because so many people are actively involved in this, as well as in the internet in general, their social lives have changed, sometimes dra- matically. Furthermore, new, very active, social worlds have been, and are being, created on the internet; users are actively creating a more richly social internet. Because of its impact on the larger social world, and because of the social worlds that it is creating, Web 2.0, as well as whatever form the web takes in the future (Web 3.0), should (must) be of increasing concern to sociologists. Technology is social: an inTroducTion To social Technologies online Barry Wellman (Wellman, Salaff, Dimitrova, Garton, Gulia & Haythornthwaite 1996; Wellman & Gulia 1999a, 1999b; Wellman, Haase, Witte & Hampton 2001; Wellman & Haythornthwaite 2002) has argued that computer networks can be social (see especially Wellman et al.’s [1996] article, “Computer Networks as Social Networks: Collaborative Work, Telework, and Virtual Community”). One of his early insights is that virtual communities are based more on shared interests The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Sociology, First Edition. Edited by George Ritzer. © 2012 Blackwell Publishing Ltd. Published 2012 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd. Copyright © 2011. Wiley. All rights reserved. May not be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except fair uses permitted under U.S. or applicable copyright law. EBSCO Publishing : eBook Collection (EBSCOhost) - printed on 7/15/2015 7:55 PM via SAN DIEGO STATE UNIV AN: 405768 ; Ritzer, George.; The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Sociology Account: sdsu the internet, web 2.0, and beyond 627 than on shared characteristics of individuals. Following Castells’ (1996) influential ideas on “the network society,” Wellman and Hampton (1999) argue that we have moved from “little boxes” of shared characteristics and geographical limitations to a world of networks. They deal with the then-emerging web and ask whether it will connect us to each other or disconnect us from “real life” communities. They state that while there “is no technological determinism, there are technological implica- tions” (Wellman & Hampton 1999: 649). Wellman and Haythornthwaite (2002) wrote important early articles discussing the social nature of computing at a time when the internet was just becoming an important part of everyday life. Wellman and Haythornthwaite’s interest in social capital carries on, as we will see below, through future research, even though most current work has moved away from this topic. Ackerman, Halverson, Erickson, Kellogg, and Orlikowski (2008) also pub- lished an influential early article discussing technology in the workplace as process- situated and enacted within social interaction. Web 1.0 versus Web 2.0 Web 2.0 is a term coined by Tim O’Reilly (2005) as part of “The Web 2.0 Confer- ence” held in 2004. His early description of the concept was not fully coherent. As a result, the term came to be used in various ways. One could simply see Web 1.0 and 2.0 as involving different time periods. That is, Web 1.0 describes the internet that existed in the five, or so, years before the dot-com bubble burst in 2000, or more generally the first decade of the internet (the 1990s). In contrast, that which exists at the present, or the internet’s second decade (from 2000 to the time of this writing in early 2011), is Web 2.0. Another way to contrast the two is by the change in connectivity speed. Web 1.0 was most likely to be experienced through dial-up connections and Web 2.0 through high-speed broadband connections. Yet another view of this move from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0 focuses on the shift of the internet from existing exclusively on computer screens towards other, often mobile, platforms, such as laptops (and net books), cell phones (i.e., “smart phones”), and other internet-capable devices (such as the iPad). However, we reject the view that Web 1.0 and 2.0 can be completely distinguished from one another. Instead, we see them as overlapping and coexistent (Jurgenson & Ritzer 2009; Jurgenson 2010; Ritzer & Jurgenson 2010). Not only have Web 1.0 and 2.0 coexisted, they continue to coexist to this day. Corporate sites charac- teristic of Web 1.0 continue to populate the web and there has been at least some user-generated content, in the form of email, chatrooms (Usenet), MUDs, and MOOs, for as long as the internet has been in existence.1 However, it is the explo- sion of user-generated content that defines Web 2.0 and differentiates it from the provider-generated content of Web 1.0. Put somewhat differently, Web 2.0 is a more locally conceived, bottom-up system while Web 1.0 is more centrally conceived and top-down. Web 1.0 encompasses older websites that had not yet taken advantage of the user-generated content as well as today’s sites that remain top-down. Exam- ples of Web 1.0 include the following: • Switchboard.com and YellowPages.com, which centrally conceive how users find people and businesses through the framework of the sites. Copyright © 2011. Wiley. All rights reserved. May not be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except fair uses permitted under U.S. or applicable copyright law. EBSCO Publishing : eBook Collection (EBSCOhost) - printed on 7/15/2015 7:55 PM via SAN DIEGO STATE UNIV AN: 405768 ; Ritzer, George.; The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Sociology Account: sdsu 628 nathan jurgenson and george ritzer • The Apple Store and other shopping sites that dictate the content and users’ browsing (i.e., shopping). • Online consumption of news on Web 1.0 is more centrally conceived than today’s more popular news sites which often allow users to “comment,” or allow communities to direct user searches through the use of “most emailed,” “most blogged,” or “most searched” lists. News sites in the past that did not have these features, as well as those news sites that have not incorporated them to this day, are examples of Web 1.0. • The creators of Fodors.com use their own tastemakers to point tourists to various hotels, restaurants, activities, and so forth. More general information is searched for on sites like about.com, whose creators employ “experts” to help users find information, again, exemplifying the centrally conceived nature of Web 1.0. It is very tempting to offer a “grand narrative” (Lyotard 1984) of a shift over time from a top-down Web 1.0 to a bottom-up Web 2.0. However, not only are such grand narratives passé, but like all grand narratives, this one would be far too simplistic. We should recognize that the degree to which users produce content on a site is not a dichotomous variable, but rather represents a continuum where some sites are further towards one end or the other of the 1.0–2.0 spectrum than other sites. At least some user-generation occurs on many Web 1.0 sites and some top- down structures exist on Web 2.0 (e.g., the format of articles on Wikipedia or the profile pages on Facebook). Thus, we define Web 1.0 by the high degree to which it is centrally conceived – a top-down creation. Web 2.0 is defined by the great extent to which it is user-generated and bottom-up. There is a clear and strong “cyber-libertarian” ideology behind Web 2.0 that seeks to keep the internet free and open (including to inputs by users). The idea is that “information should be free.” This is to be made possible by limiting or remov- ing structures online that limit that freedom. Cyber-libertarianism privileges the power and wisdom of “the crowd.” However, this ideology was also present in Web 1.0. Indeed, it was present at the very beginning of all thinking about the internet and its possibilities. The internet, much like many other technologies, was conceived by some as a revolutionary, if not utopian, development that would bring great increases in freedom for those involved (as will be seen later in this chapter). In spite of such great hopes and grand ambitions, the internet has not been able to fully resist corporate structures, hierarchies, and control. Lawrence Lessig (1999, 2006) discusses this in his influential book, Code, where he looks at how the inter- net is regulated by legal and computer code. Indeed, the legal regulation of the internet has been a hotly contested topic surrounding what has come to be known as the “net-neutrality” debate that pits the cyber-libertarians against the corporate and legal efforts to restrict the use of the internet. Companies like AOL and Micro- soft have sought to control many internet technologies with their own products and to purchase online real estate much in the way this occurs in the material world. In this way, Web 1.0 came to be in conflict with cyber-libertarian ideals. Corporate entities sought, sometimes successfully, to control the ways users interacted with the web. They also created centrally conceived internet products that structured and greatly limited the ways in which individuals used the internet.