What about Twine, the first mainstream semantic web app?

What about Twine? Will they, besides serving as a step into the semantic web, also serve as an integrator of social services, i.e. a part of the the Web 2.1, according to my definition?

We don't know much yet, apart from some screen shots in Read & Write's article about Twine, since it is yet only in private beta-test. But I have now registered to be a part of that at their site, and am looking very much forward to participate in the testing.

If any of you has more information, or even tried hands-on, please speak up!

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Time for a Web 2.1 Wiki?

It is the intention by this blog by the time to create a continuously updated overview of Web 2.1 initiatives, preferably including some comparative reviews of the various services.

But already after a few days of research I asses that will demand more than a one-man driven blog.

So what a Web 2.1 Wiki? Where Web 2.1 services are described by many contributors according to predefined (but also adjustable) parameters like:

• type (providing common identities, comments/postings, friends-networks, feeds or more of these)
• current user base, geographical penetration
  
• usability
• openness (not restricted to predefined social networks)
• principal organizer, owner interests?
  

Too late with Web 2.1? !

I began collecting information about "Web 2.1 initiatives" some days ago, initiatives who, according to my definition should facilitate a more clear overview of the growing wilderness of Web 2.0 services.

But already now these 2.1 initiatives seems - not quite unexpectedly - to be a fast growing wilderness, where it can be feared that we will need a new layer of services to aggregate the 2.1-sites, which then should be Web 2.2!

I hope this won't be necessary, that the players behind the already taken 2.1 initiatives will begin to work together and integrate their solutions. Some have got the ideal brick for handling identities, others for group posting, others maybe for transfer of contacts and so on. If they build them together they could probably build a beautiful house with a perfect usability! In stead of keeping to their individual small houses, where only one facility is really functioning well.

What can you observe out there?
- An exponential and unstopping growht in "2.1-initiatives", or do we have most of them listed in the sidebar here under Web 2.1.?
- Some examples of cooperation between 2.1-players, or maybe vague signs at that direction?
- More 2.1-initiatives, that are still not listed here? You're also welcome to inform about initiatives, that are still only on the drafting board

PS to Facebook-users: I have now created a FB-group for users interested in Web 2.1. You are all welcome to join that.

Michael Geist: Pull down the walled gardens

"The irony of the current generation of online social networks is that although their premise is leveraging the internet to connect people, their own lack of interconnectedness is stifling their potential.

Some services may believe that it is in their economic interest to stick to a walled garden approach; however, given the global divisions within the social networking world, the mix of language, user preferences, and network effects, it is unlikely that one or two services will capture the global marketplace. The better approach - for users and the sites themselves - would be to work towards a world of interoperable social networking."

This is the conclusion by Michael Geist in an article on BBC News with the headline " Pull down the walled gardens". He is of course 100% right in this statement. If they give it a second thought the companies behind the big social networks will realize that it will be in their own interest to tare down the walls around their gardens.

In the same article Geist also mentions some initiatives to promote interoperability, namely the Liberty Alliance and Project Higgins, which "are two privacy-focused identity management initiatives that claim to provide users with the ability to manage their personal information across social networks in a secure and trusted manner". I will investigate these project further and them to the list of Web 2.1 initiatives.

Links:
BBC News: Pull down the walled gardens
Michael Geist's blog: www.michaelgeist.ca

Michael Geist holds the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law at the University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law.

A selected list of integrative - Web 2.1 - services!

Hereby a little selection of some of the new sites with the aim to support overview of and interoperability between social networks:
- Profile builder: www.profilebuilder.com
- 8hands: www.8hands.com
- OpenId: www.myopenid.com
- CoComment: www.cocomment.com
- Notifir (will be launched at the 1. of Sep, 2007): www.notifir.com

It is my aim to create a complete and updated list of Web 2.1 services. The first version will be published here tomorrow.

You are welcome to provide with items for this list. It will also be nice with a short description, and - even better - a review of the usability of the concrete service

Welcome to Web 2.1!

Under the umbrella called Web 2.0 there has already been developed a tremendous amount of services, especially social networks, like Facebook, Jaiku, Twitter, Pownce, etc. etc

By the time it becomes quite time consuming to be active on all the upcoming social networks, keep them updated with data, interests, connetions to friends etc. and use them for their purpose, discussions, exchange of stories, knowledge, pictures, music etc. etc.

Thus there is a growing need to work across the many platforms.

And hopefully a lot of people are working to developing facilities to post comments across sites, there are more initiatives to make it easier to handle IDENTITIES across more social networks, f.i. Profile Builder. I think all initiatives in direction to coordinate, integrate, aggregate all newly - and quite "anarchisticly" - developed services under the umbrella named Web 2.0 are very positive. Without such initiatives it will soon be more than a full time job just to keep up with the newest development in social media.

Some days ago I called the various initiatives in direction of creating better overview and cooperation in this wonderful and fertile wilderness for Web 2.1 in a discussion on Pownce. And I have decided to keep with that!

It is thus the objective for this blog to gather and present information on new intiatives to promote the development of Web 2.1. And you are all very welcome to contribute with:
- information about new start-ups
- idéas how to support the development of Web 2.1
- experiences with and reviews of the new tools

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