Web 2.0 Services: A Rich Toolbox for Information Professionals

Mihir Mahajan

[email_address]

8 February 2008

Web circa 1995

Content publishers

Portals – Yahoo!, AOL

Websites and homepages

Finding content

Search engines – AltaVista, Ask Jeeves

Directory services – Yahoo!, Lycos

One way traffic from information providers to viewers

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What the Web does: Help connect people to information and other people

People are not just information consumers but also information producers

People are social

People want open access to information

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Web 2.0: An Interactive and Social Web

Open

Provide open access to information

Social

Develop, recognize and utilize connections between people

Participatory

User contributed content

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… but so were parts of the older Web!

Amazon.com product reviews

eBay feedback system

Commenting features on web sites

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Web 2.0 uses better tools…

Open interfaces make the Internet a platform

Maps – Google Maps

Metadata – Amazon.com, IMDB

Site APIs – eBay

RSS (Really Simple Syndication)

XML (eXtensible Markup Language)

JavaScript client side scripting

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… to develop better services! 8 February 2008 Application Web 1.0 Web 2.0 Photo sharing Yahoo! Photos Flickr, Picasa, Facebook Photos Music / content distribution mp3.com iTunes, Pandora, Joost Reference Britannica Online Wikipedia Library management Custom databases Facebook Books iRead, Librarything.com Personal pages Personal websites Blogging Event planning-RSVP Evite/ Email invites Upcoming.org, Facebook Events Content management/ publication Custom websites Drupal Content classification systems Taxonomy-based - Yahoo! directory Tagging – Flickr, del.icio.us Bookmarking Browser bookmarks del.icio.us, Digg.com Citation databases Procite, EndNote bibsonomy.org and many more…

How are these services better?

Easy to set up, easy to learn, easy to use

Customizable, adapt to user needs

Open access, often open source

Fun to use!

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How you can use Web 2.0: Publish!

Blog is an easy-to-use publication medium

Reverse chronological posts

Can include text, images, multimedia

Can be tagged by topic, author, and other metadata

What can you use it for?

Organization wide news and announcements

Industry news updates

Training materials

.. blogs are flexible, use your imagination!

How?

Blog sites: Blogger, LiveJournal, Typepad

Blogging software: MovableType, WordPress

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How you can use Web 2.0: Share!

Share your recommendations

Bookmarking – del.icio.us

Bibliography – bibsonomy.org

Bookshelves – librarything.com

Set up collections, then share !

Photos – Flickr, Picasaweb

Videos – Youtube

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How you can use Web 2.0: Collaborate!

Set up your own wiki

Wiki hosting sites

Wiki software – MediaWiki, TikiWiki

Collaborate online

Google Apps

Google Calendar

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What others have done

Wikis for research collaboration

Facebook Causes

Google Maps + US Elections

Google Maps to show real-time updates of natural disasters

Hurricane Katrina

San Diego fires

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Web 2.0 is not a panacea 8 February 2008 Topic Issue Strategies for resolution Lack of permanence Most of Web 2.0 is new and evolving Tools you use today may not exist tomorrow Use popular tools backed by a strong user community Set up archival practices Privacy Inadvertent sharing of private information Implement a clear and consistent privacy practice Set user expectations of privacy Reliability of sources User contributed content not a substitute for a primary source Rely on primary sources Create user awareness about relative merits of different sources Copyright Content contributors may not hold/ assert copyright Be aware of online copyright issues and follow best practices