Why the Web Evolved into Web 2.0 - Item 1

There were a great number of technological developments that helped evolve the Web into the Web 2.0 we know today, but most of us don't realise them. A few of these developments I believe had a bigger influence then others, such as:

• Connectivity available almost everywhere
• Web-based applications were developed for many devices
• Society embraced technological changes

Connectivity Available almost Everywhere
The World Wide Web was distributed globally thanks to the help of the Internet. A lot of people think the Internet and World Wide web are the same thing, but they are not. The Internet was actually invented a few years before the World Wide Web (Murphy 2011, August 6).

The Internet is a system of local area networks, regional networks, and other separate networks that are all inter-connected like a spider web. It was a system some businesses used to keep information inside their business.

Example of networks (Reading Response : Lessons
from the History of the Internet, August 6, 2012)

This "spider web" is what is used by computers to communicate to other computers. For example, computer "A" can connect up to computer "B", or even smart phone "C" to exchange information thanks to this "webbed" network (Murphy 2011, August 6).

Who created the world wide web though and why? It was all thanks to a man called Tim Berners-Lee. While he was working at a company called "Cern", he noticed there was a lot of random information in his job that didn't relate to each other. So he came up with a program called "Enquire" which linked all this information together. This program helped give him the idea for the World Wide Web later on in his carrier.

He purposed a project to his company about making a program that would link all the information that was at his firm on the internet. This project further gave him the idea to link the internet and hypertext markup language together to make a global information centre. Also being the kind of person he was, instead of making million and most likely billion from his idea, Tim gave his invention away for free.

Web-based applications were developed for many devices

Different Mobile Devices (Mobile
Device Configuration, 2012 August 6) 

Client-server computing use to have each application have it's own client program and worked as a user interface. This user interface had to be installed to each user's computer in order to enable the application (History of web application, 2007 July 13).

Although today most web applications use HTML or XHTML that are usually supported by all the browsers. Every Web page is displayed to a client as a static document in which lets the user navigate through the content on the page. The difference in a web application is that it provides a more interactive experience on the client side (History of web application, 2007 July 13).

All mobile devices use XHTML to apply the same effect a web application would have on a personal computer. This is because XHTML uses CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) which is helpful in resizing Web pages as well as content for client-side viewing outside the use of a personal computer.

Society embraced technological changes

First year medical students using the iPad.
(Health care embraces the iPad, February 7, 2011)

People from all over the globe are adopting technology earlier than their previous of kin. Research from Las Vegas reveals that consumers are understanding technology and adopting it because it is the future. Mr. Wargo, the director of industry analysis for the Consumer Electronics Association (or CEA), stated that people are not just upgrading their current technologies, but buying new one's every year.  (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6238309.stm)

From the research point of view, consumers of the current generation are adopting technologies early and are understanding it well.