publishing2.0
media2.0
agency2.0
marketing2.0
advertising2.0
audience2.0
Search 2.0
web2.0
Seriously guys, you are not helping 
The cluetrain had it right when it said the markets were conversations, and Scoble had it partially right when he said the next web was a human web (I say partially right because it’s a human web right now). What is catapulting the web into the 21st century is not the technology, not the ajax, not the SOA, it’s the people, or more accurate the propensity of people to be social, and interact.
A term that i’m seeing gain more currency, and IMHO is more meaningful and inclusive than 2.0 is “social”, social media, social advertising, social media marketing, social software, even social video. Meda is a great term, media being the collective term for medium, a medium being something that “occupies a middle position” “a means of effecting or conveying something”, so the web is a “Social Medium”? The tools collectively “Social Media”?
What better describes youtube, flickr, delicious, digg, magnolia, myspace, tagworld, facebook, furl, frappr, zooomr, SecondLife, blogs, podcasts, wikis, citizen media, WOM, peer production, crowdsourcing, vlogs, viral advertising, rocketboom, zefrank?
Social Media or Web2.0?
It’s more than technology, it’s technology and people making stuff happen, the web is a massive socio-technical system. Take Google for example, it’s a huge social engineering experiment on the wisdom of crowds, it is in fact a social search engine because it relies primarily on what people link to.
Do you think the Long-Tail has anything to do with Web2.0? No it doesn’t, it relies upon people being more networked, more connected, it relies upon Social Media.
So please, i beg of you next time your going to add 2.0 to anything, think “is it social?” are people driving it? .
Who talks about social media:
Steve Rubel of Micropersuasion
BL Ochman of WhatNextBlog
(both part of socialmedia group)
Richard MacManus at ReadWriteWeb
Chris Carfi at The Social Customer Manifesto
The Church of the Customer
Yahoo – guide to social media tools
CNN the Net 25
Paidcontent.org
How about it guys, is this the beginning of a social-media manifesto, are you in?
Oh, and Andrew, this is as much 2.0 as my second coffee this morning was 2.0
Sidenote: What happened to the cluetrain.com, it’s down right now? Anyone? Anyone?
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Amen!
http://managementinnovationgroup.com/ideas/can-large-companies-succeed-with-social-media/
It seems to me that the technology rowd likes 2.0 as a “paradigm shift’ marker from command and control-oriented software to ones that are more open and collaborative – let alone adaptable to many new technology platforms. The media crowd wants to stuff ’social media’ back into their own version of C&C – AKA inoculation models (or unidirectional ones) of communication rather than interactive conversations where people generate content, not just creative departments.
As someone interested in change, social media makes all the sense in the world (always has, see social networks and social support research). As I say in my talks, the world has always been social, it’s just that the ‘2.0′ shifts make it more obvious, trackable and thus measurable to the people with the money. If I can now track ‘buzz’ and not just ‘reach and frequency’ why not invest some dollars in it for a few years and try it out. The questions are :
What are the appropriate expectations for the effectiveness of social media (and I would include the new fascination with that ‘old world’ idea of WOM)?
How do we adequately measure the impact of social media programs, marketing and social change efforts – the social network analysis folks should be in their prime for the next few years?
Great points Craig,
The world has always been social, but the web makes it the influence of these connections between people visible, and for management people, measurable
I don’t have a problem with bloggers/people throwing around such labels, as long as they have an idea of the concepts behind them. But I will agree, I like ’social media’ better than Web 2.0. Course I’m starting to like ’social marketing’, but I think some people would confuse that with ’cause marketing’.
Mack says:
“I like ’social media’ better than Web 2.0.”
Me, too. I used to really like Web 2.0…but I’m realizing its limitations. It just doesn’t *mean* anything.
“Course I’m starting to like ’social marketing’, but I think some people would confuse that with ’cause marketing’.”
…I agree. Social network marketing, maybe?
I agree social marketing has too many connotations around causemarketing. Maybe too long but I like “social media marketing”, that means viral, wom, myspace promos, etc. anything where the social media is part of the transmision.
Recently, while talking to someone about my website they said, “It’s all about Web 2.0 man!”
I shuddered. Dare I ask him what he means, for him to tell me, “It’s about Web 2.0!” over and over again.
I use the term “social media” and generally prefer the term “social …” over “Web 2.0″ which will always sound technical, and I think many people associate it with a “look” versus community + communication.
The Internet is a social beast, end of story. It always has been since the first person sent the first email or put up the first web page…technology is helping advance that cause and opening doors and possibilities, but it’s an evolution in my opinion not a huge paradigm shift. It’s always been heading in this direction, like almost anything good (or great), it takes time.
Karl,
You do yourself grave discredit when the examples that you kick off your rant with don’t prove your point — if you actually read Richard MacManus’ Search 2.0 article (which I doubt you did), you’ll see that the Search 2.0 distinguishes itself from traditional search by being all about the PEOPLE. Publishing 2.0, if you took the time to read the About, focuses on how the convergence of media and technology empowers PEOPLE.
So I completely agree with your point, but because of the way you approached it, I walk away your blog probably never never never never to come back again.
Thanks Scott,
The examples i kick off my rant are all about people, that’s right, and my argument is that almost everything designated 2.0 is about people or “social”. In my mind the examples I give totally prove my point. I give them as great examples of 2.0 things that are really social.
I think the article on Read/write web (which Richard edited, but didn’t write) about search 2.0 was a great piece of work, the only “inaccuracy” was it’s title “search 2.0″, I would have preferred social search
Anyway, Scott whether you come back or not, thanks for making me feel so important by storming out, I’m sure that only happens on the best blogs
Cheers,
karl
Oh yeah! Well, I just figured out what everyone was referring to when they said Web 2.0 so I’m going to keep on using it, if for no other reason than to simply piss Karl off
Luv ya buddy
Another reason why “Social media” is a better term than “Web 2.0″ is the fact that it isn’t protected as the brand.
http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2006/05/controversy_about_our_web_20_s.html
I think the social aspect is solely about connectivity which is essnetially enhanced by the technology – the question though is whether that connectivity is genuine. My post from a while back http://makemarketinghistory.blogspot.com/2006/06/co-operative-crowds-versus.html highlights some of my thoughts and I’m currently trying to fit that into a more formal marketing framework.