Finishing Up O'Reilly's Seven Web 2.0 Principles

In earlier posts I discussed two of the O'Reilly Web 2.0 principles ("The Web as Platform" and "Harnessing Collective Intelligence"). In this entry I'll discuss a couple more: "End of the Software Release Cycle" and "Rich User Experiences." I would also like to note two other O'Reilly principles, "Data is the Next Intel Inside" and "Software Above the Level of a Single Device," which I will not delve into. However, if you would like more information on these two principles please see the "What is Web 2.0" article I have been referencing for these posts.

End of the Software Release Cycle
What exactly does "End of the Software Release Cycle" mean? Essentially, the Web 2.0 era is a time of the constant beta -- software accessed through the internet with a web browser is always in the developmental stage. Take the Google applications as an example. I use Gmail, Calendar, Documents, and Reader and they are always evolving. However, the evolution is not intrusive -- meaning that it does not affect my ability to continue to use the tools. Most of the changes are transparent, but occasionally there will be a significant update that is easily apparent. Of the Google tools I use, Documents seems to change the most. See the below image from a Phil Lenssen 28 Feb blog post.

As you can see, the change here was a simple update to the tool bar in Google Documents. But this change highlights the continuous beta cycle of the Web 2.0 era. As O'Reilly states, "...one of the defining characteristics of internet era software is that it is delivered as a service, not as a product."

The Google Documents example is pretty powerful because, essentially, what you have with Documents is an internet mini version (word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software) of the Microsoft Office suite -- albeit a less robust version -- that only requires a web browser, is constantly evolving (in beta form), is accessible anywhere there is internet access, and there is no long software development and release cycle. The service is always being improved and it's free. This type of development cycle is significantly different than what we are used to from the PC or client-server era, and will require a significant paradigm shift for software companies still in the design and release a product model -- as opposed to a software as a service model.

Rich User Experiences
This is another way of saying that web developers are now able to build web applications as rich as local PC-based applications.

Continuing with the Google theme, according to O'Reilly, Gmail was the first "mainstream" web application to deliver rich user interfaces and PC-equivalent interactivity. The combination of several technologies, which became known as AJAX, made this leap forward possible. Since Gmail was introduced a flood of other software service applications with rich interfaces has followed. According to O'Reilly:

"We expect to see many new web applications over the next few years, both truly novel applications, and rich web reimplementations of PC applications. Every platform change to date has also created opportunities for a leadership change in the dominant applications of the previous platform."

Using the Google Documents example again, essentially O'Reilly is saying that a platform change -- from a PC-based software PRODUCT (Microsoft Office) to an internet-based comparative software SERVICE (Google Documents) -- based on a rich user experience has the potential to cause a paradigm shift in the way we view and use computers.

At the end of the day, O'Reilly's Web 2.0 principles have offered a great start point for exploring the Web 2.0 phenomena. With these principles as a foundation, in future posts I will delve into some of the Web 2.0 applications and technology that I am discovering.