So, in case anyone is curious, or if your somewhat of a geek like me, you might be interested in some of the details behind the web site. And because I think it's pretty interesting, I figured I'd put up a post about it.
NING and Web 2.0
This site, and all the things that you can do here are all free services provided by ning.com
Ning.com is part of a relatively new wave that is taking over the internet. This wave has been dubbed "Web 2.0" or "Social Networking" and there are many examples of this out there. Traditionally, web sites provided content that people would read and use as needed. This was fine, but it's primarily use was publishing information for others to consume. There really wasnt an easy means for all the people reading the content to collaborate or discuss or contribute to the content that was out there. This is kind of a shame because if you think about it, there are many many people reading content, but only 1 person that publishes it.
Social Networks
With web 2.0, the idea is that now there is a way for all the people out there online to not only collaborate about content, but also (more importantly) - to contribute to it. Web 2.0 includes blogs and wikis that are basically ways for the average person to not only read content, but also to create content and edit existing content to correct mistakes, add information, and contribute their expertise to the rest of the community.
Collective Intelligence (or lack there of)
This ability for all the people out there on the internet to not only consume information, but to also contribute to the information that's out there really changes things for the web in a big way. Now, the collective intelligence of everyone who's on-line can be harnessed in a way that provides more information and better quality information to everyone. Now, even people that don't put web sites up can contribute their experience to sites that are "Web 2.0" capable. This makes the internet a much more active and collaborative place and really makes it possible for all of us humans to work together regardless of location to accomplish great things. It also has it's dark side as you may have seen on my previous attempt at the family site last year. (we had lots of undesireables contributing very questionable content to the site)
Examples to Check Out
Some examples of this web 2.0 stuff include wikipedia (an online encyclopedia where all the content is contributed by people out there surfing. You can look things up in wikipedia and actually edit the information yourself. If you post something incorrectly, others will correct it. It's an interesting idea and sometimes a free for all (check out the wikipedia entries for democrat and republican, or liberal and conservative). But in general, it works, and wikipedia is a valuable resource to find out about almost anything. (leveragine the collective intelligence of everyone who contributes). Blogs are another example where anyone can write about anything and others can comment on what is written.
Even a geek like me can blog about geeky things like Web 2.0.
Other examples include sites like LinkedIn.com (for professional networking), IdeaStorm.com for people discussing ideas,
Zoho.com allows you to create documents like word docs, spreadsheets, presentations etc. and share them with others. Google Docs is another example of this. There are lots of other examples too.
Anyway, enough for today. I'll pick a more interesting topic for next time (religion? politics?) I'll think of something!
