Was I Ahead of Myself?

Was I Ahead of Myself?
When my publisher asked for a third edition of my book, I suggested calling it "3.0" as if it were a piece of software. (Well, it's better than "Geeks' Edition," which was the second edition.) Now I seem to have anticipated the Next Big Thing, according to this story in the New York Times: Entrepreneurs See a Web Guided by Common Sense. Excerpt: From the billions of documents that form...

When my publisher asked for a third edition of my book, I suggested calling it "3.0" as if it were a piece of software. (Well, it's better than "Geeks' Edition," which was the second edition.)

Now I seem to have anticipated the Next Big Thing, according to this story in the New York Times: Entrepreneurs See a Web Guided by Common Sense. Excerpt:

From the billions of documents that form the World Wide Web and the links that weave them together, computer scientists and a growing collection of start-up companies are finding new ways to mine human intelligence.

Their goal is to add a layer of meaning on top of the existing Web that would make it less of a catalog and more of a guide — and even provide the foundation for systems that can reason in a human fashion. That level of artificial intelligence, with machines doing the thinking instead of simply following commands, has eluded researchers for more than half a century.

Referred to as Web 3.0, the effort is in its infancy, and the very idea has given rise to skeptics who have called it an unobtainable vision. But the underlying technologies are rapidly gaining adherents, at big companies like I.B.M. and Google as well as small ones. Their projects often center on simple, practical uses, from producing vacation recommendations to predicting the next hit song.

But in the future, more powerful systems could act as personal advisers in areas as diverse as financial planning, with an intelligent system mapping out a retirement plan for a couple, for instance, or educational consulting, with the Web helping a high school student identify the right college.

The projects aimed at creating Web 3.0 all take advantage of increasingly powerful computers that can quickly and completely scour the Web.

“I call it the World Wide Database,” said Nova Spivack, the founder of a start-up firm whose technology detects relationships between nuggets of information by mining the World Wide Web. “We are going from a Web of connected documents to a Web of connected data.”

Well, connecting data is what writing itself is all about. But I don't know if my book is going to help people navigate the World Wide Database. Still, I totally agree with this pioneer of Web 3.0:

“The system will know that spotless is better than clean,” said Oren Etzioni, an artificial-intelligence researcher at the University of Washington who is a leader of the project. “There is the growing realization that text on the Web is a tremendous resource.”

Many Web 2.0 Sites Fail to Link to Related Content
For all of their surging traffic, a lot of blogging, social networking, community and other Web 2.0 sites truly fail at keeping people on their site in the most basic way - by pointing people to related content within their...

Expression Web Designer Beta
I had been anxious to check out Microsoft’s new Expression Web Designer, not because I had any issues with FrontPage 2003, but because I like playing with new programs. I was thrilled when I received the download notice for the initial private beta, which they have since offered to the general public. I am probably not [...]

Websites that changed the world
The Guardian Unlimited has celebrated the 15th anniversary of the World Wide Web with an article that also lists 15 Websites that changed the world. You'll probably disagree with many of the sites on the list, but the Web has indeed changed the world....

The Guardian Unlimited has celebrated the 15th anniversary of the World Wide Web with an article that also lists 15 Websites that changed the world.

You'll probably disagree with many of the sites on the list, but the Web has indeed changed the world.

links for 2007-02-22
Wiki - AboutUs A wiki about every web site. (tags: Wikis) » Explode, a meta-social network | The Social Web | ZDNet.com "Explode, a new service from Curverider (the British startup behind Elgg), is described as "a simple way to...

The Risk of AdSense Revenue
Generic advertisements such as Google AdSense absolutely do not belong on a professional business website. No matter how you look at it, it will not help improve your business and may very well have a devastating impact. Is it really worth the risk? Those people who have no clue what Google AdSense is, will likely become [...]

Links to the New Edition
Writing for the Web 3.0 is now officially available. I've placed links to Self-Counsel Press in the right-hand column. If you're in the US, you can buy the book through the lower link; if you're in Canada or elsewhere in the world, the upper link is the one you want. If you're in the UK, you can also order the book through the Roundhouse Group. In the next few days...

Writing for the Web 3.0 is now officially available. I've placed links to Self-Counsel Press in the right-hand column. If you're in the US, you can buy the book through the lower link; if you're in Canada or elsewhere in the world, the upper link is the one you want. If you're in the UK, you can also order the book through the Roundhouse Group.

In the next few days I'll add some resources here that are available as a CD in the book...but only for PC users. So Mac users can download those resources here.