Web 2.0 Design

Demonz Media is a leading Web 2.0 Design Team based in Sydney.

This article details some web 2.0 concepts and how they can be applied as practical solutions with examples. If you’re interested in hiring a web 2.0 design team please visit Demonz Media, or if you would like to know more about web 2.0 and web 2.0 design, please continue reading.
 
Web 2.0 is the business revolution in the computer industry caused by the move to the Internet as platform, and an attempt to understand the rules for success on that new platform.
- Tim O’Reilly

Web 2.0 allows businesses to target and network more closely with interested users. However to receive the benefits from this new ‘industry’ it is very important to understand the basic principles of modern web design and information/social architecture. To better understand these issues and how they can be resolved it is important to look at the underlying philosophy of modern web design and why businesses build web 2.0 sites.

1) The Long Tail
One of the strongest motivations for building and building upon web 2.0 technologies for businesses is to leverage upon the “long tail”. This is the idea of selling a large number of unique items in small quantities (which in total adds up to a lot of sales). “Long tail” theory suggests markets with a high level of choice and freedom favor the most popular 20% of items over the 80% of “long tail” items. Targeting a large number of niche items (instead of the top 20% exclusively) can therefore be very profitable. This phenomenon could also be described as an ‘economy of scale’, where small profits received many times add up to big profits. iTunes is a service which utilizes web technology to distribute “long tail” goods. While it is impractical for store based music outlets to store hard copies of ‘unpopular’ music, it is quite possible for Apple to store a large number of niche albums electronically from their server. As all sales are performed electronically, a large chunk of the overhead is removed (as there is no need to make a physical copy at any point) and since audio files can be easily transmitted across the web at a trivial sum there are no shipping costs.
 
2) The Network Factor
Another very important element of web 2.0 is the ‘network’ factor. A network could be defined in this case as a group of interested users who frequent particular online channels. For example http://www.threadless.com/submissions is a site which allows users to submit their own tee-shirt designs. Based on feedback by members of the site, the designs are either accepted or rejected. If a shirt is printed based on a contributors design, the contributor receives a percentage of the sale.

3) User Based, User Contributed Model
User based contribution implies that rather than information filtering down from a few major sources, information actually filters up from a grass roots level back through the network. There are specific elements which can aide the creation of ‘user based’ sites. For example, they usually contain some sort of ‘profile’ system and the ability to communicate with other users in both a private and public way, using this profile as a base. Depending on the network, ‘social media’ sites also promote the open distribution of media, which could include gossip, videos, photographs and more. Hence a challenge of web 2.0 design is providing a set of content management tools for non-savvy users.

Often these networks can be used as a search resource for ‘people’ as many sites allow users to perform criteria based searches for other users with similar interests, where the presence of ‘users’ is as important (or more-so) than the presence of information. MySpace is an excellent example of this.

4) Open Platforms, Syndication and the “Mash-Up”
Content syndication formats such as RSS (a type of XML feed) aide distribution and redistribution through networks by standardizing the way information is transmitted between and within networks. Hence web 2.0 is synonymous with a number of technologies including JSON, XML, SOAP, REST which are standardized formats for transmitting data in between websites.

The motivation for businesses to create syndicated feeds is for submission to particular content networks – for example ‘comparison shopping’ services including Google Product Search use ‘ROR’ (XML) feeds aggregated from many eCommerce sites to create a universal product search, therefore creating these feeds is highly beneficial to the business.

5) Web Based Applications and Services
There are many advantages to businesses creating web based applications over desk-top applications. It helps to eliminate ‘dependency hell’, as the only required software is the web browser. As the software only needs to be installed on the server(s) instead of hundreds of client-side computers, it can also be more economic to deploy by removing the cost of having to install licensed software on every single machine.

One type of web based application is the web based company ‘intranet’, which is a group of software (often referred to as ‘groupware’) stored on a company web-server. Company members are then assigned a ‘profile’ or ‘account’ (similar to a social media network). This account can be assigned various levels of access (e.g. members of the public versus “registered” users) which effect their interaction and involvement within the website. Once this framework exists, the possibilities of the network can be extended (almost limitlessly) through the addition of components without the end user ever having to upgrade software on the client’s machine.

Another example is enterprise eCommerce platforms, which are typically coupled with CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems. The amalgamation of these systems helps to manage public users (i.e. ‘clients’) who use the sales network. For example, public users might be able to see the storefront and post feedback, while company employees as ‘registered’ users can see the administration sections for managing sales and related tasks (e.g. sending newsletters). The result is a stronger network between the client and the company.

Conclusion
While the definition of web 2.0 is quite loose, the examples provided should help to clarify what the basic principles might be and how your business can benefit from embracing these principles.