What is the semantic web?

A guy named John Markoff wrote an article for the “New York Times” in 2006 that sparked some pretty heated discussion, which continues to this day. He proposed, early in the scheme of things, but certainly not for the first time, that the term “Web 3.0” be used to describe the Internet’s next evolutionary step, which he predicted would be marked by an avalanche of “smart apps.” I don’t want to sound like a 10 year old on a road trip, but, “Are we there yet?”

No, we’re not, but don’t get hung up on the number scheme; if it did, it would have to peg progress toward Web 2.6 more or less, because the fact is that evolution, of any kind, isn’t all that precise or predictable. Evolution is gradual for the most part, but “punctuated,” as the famous paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould observed, by occasional periods of rapid change. In the case at hand, there was a flurry of progress that has now leveled off somewhat, but a key “enabling technology” is the Semantic Web which is still emerging.

What’s in a name (or number)?

Clearly, the Web is moving into a new era, one that features more of those “smart apps” that will be empowered and advanced by adding more semantics to the raw data. Does this evolutionary advance, still in process, really qualify the Web to advance to 3.0? In fact, what does “Web 2.0” mean? Why didn’t anyone call the first iteration of the information highway “version 1”? As directly as possible, here’s a reasonable description of what the version numbers attached to “Web” really mean:

Web 1.0: In the beginning (sounds like the beginning of another famous tale) there was AOL, Geocities and Hotmail. The early days were all about read-only content, static HTML websites, and browsing from “link lists” like Yahoo.

Web 2.0: As technologies and people matured, user-generated content and “read-write” interactivity came onto the scene. People were no longer consuming mothers. Ordinary people (not in the IT industry) began to contribute their energy, information, and ideas through blogs and sites like Flickr, YouTube, Digg, and the “social networking space.” The line between consumers and content publishers became increasingly blurred as Web 2.0 inched toward the next revision number.

Web 3.0: If implemented in a manner consistent with the most publicized dreams and visions (“plans and strategies,” if you will), Web 3.0 will be the Semantic Web. Clarity and utility would result from attributing meaning to data, leading to iGoogle-like personalization, intelligent search like never before imagined, and “behavioral advertising” that adapts to individual consumers.

Same data, different lens

Certainly the term “Web 2.0,” which never achieved any sort of critical mass outside of the tech-savvy demographic, has at least come to have a stable definition over time. We can safely call it a focus on interactivity and interoperability, between apps and people, using custom application programming interfaces (APIs), widgets, and even social actions like tagging. When “Web 2.0” first entered the “digital lexicon”, many people thought it was meaningless and actually ranted and criticized its use.

Today, “Web 2.0” is an industry-standard term, if not popularly understood, and its history suggests that “Web 3.0” at least has a good chance of adoption, at least as a word. As a technology, environment, tool, or gateway to “virtual reality,” Web 3.0 will thrive as our technology and content become increasingly intelligent, individually and together. Adding meaning to data with the Semantic Web and microformats, and adding intelligence to applications, means better help for people through natural language search, semantic search, “recommendation agents”, decision assistants , etc.

It is a journey, not a destination.

Except for the fact that people like to label things, we probably wouldn’t bother with version numbers on what is essentially a graphical layer of the Internet. It’s always going to evolve, but if we have to call it something, at least “Web 3.0” is less confusing (and intimidating) than “Semantic Web” to most people. Whatever it’s called, there will be people who know a lot about how it works and where it’s going, and others who range from knowing a little to knowing nothing. It was always like that, as they say.

Web 2.0 (2.6?) and the first steps towards the Semantic Web are steering the World Wide Web towards a more collaborative way of sharing knowledge, the current case being Gould’s “punctuated equilibrium” as the new social aspect of the Web. Social media has had wide-ranging social impacts far beyond monitors, keyboards, and browsers. The Semantic Web may bring the Web closer to its ultimate destination of human-machine “understanding” and improved interaction. Web evolution continues without any central organizing authority, plan or deadline, which is good. At whatever point we stop and say, “We’re at 3.0 now,” it will remain just a milestone along the way, as web evolution, punctuated or not, will always be a journey, not a destination.

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