Seems to me that web 2.0 presents for the second time, an equal opportunity for anyone wishing to make a go at whatever they want to define as success for them on the net.
It’s like it’s 1996 all over again. Anyone can enjoy mass opportunity on the net right now. Anyone can harness the disruption caused by this second wave without any prior training. Nearly everyone with prior experience needs to be retrained at this point anyway. Some the most experienced web developers and designers seem to be having difficulty trying to catch this wave while many others haven’t even gotten on the beach yet. Anyone agree?
In 1996, the net was a wild frontier, a dot-com land grab and an entrepreneurs paradise. No matter your background or experience, the net offered unique opportunities for anyone stoopid enough to take the challenge. I say, “stoopid enough” because that’s exactly what many where thinking. The folks in the negative camps were asking if the the whole thing was even going to work. It’s like they couldn’t see the impact that free information would have on our culture and societies. If that wasn’t enough, in 2001, they got their proof.
With the crash, came minor justification to their arguments which they extolled in “I told you so” editorials, guest columns and closed door meetings about who to fire next. The media were especially helpful in disseminating this negativity as they hadn’t been able to moneitze their own efforts so why should anyone else succeed. But we were succeeding despite the negativity.
We didn’t stop building. We stopped listening. Since there was no money, we weren’t forced to build applications or sites with features that didn’t matter or make sense. We were no longer being forced to compromise usability for time to market, there was no market. No ads were being bought. Everything seemed to be failing at the highest levels. This may have cut our funding in the form of a weekly paycheck but for those that started building on the net in the first place, our intense desire to create was left alone. We persevered, staying strong, continuing to learn to make this new freedom available and inspiring to others.
With less ad dollars, one could argue that quality spiked but without Google the good stuff was still difficult to find. Search was still emerging to help pave the way for arguably, the first Web 2.0 application, Google Search. Google lead the charge by promoting the values of free information and they set about to “organize the world’s information”. That same mindset inspired a new crowd that picked up the tools and continued developing, designing and improving workflows, largely still without funding.
With only our beliefs and some fresh inspiration to carry forward, we built highly usable sites that no one would see. As better tools came about, such as Homesite (then Dreamweaver), standards became easier to adopt and enforce. Systems were put in place to manage larger projects and teams were assembled with new players, like usability experts, content mangers, search engine marketers. Combining these roles with developers and designers caused something unique to happen. A low level team approach to sustainable development emerged completely outside of traditional business practice. Design flourished along side monetization. Now the larger players were broken down into small teams of professionals continuing to make the internet a better place.
I’m starting to ramble a bit and I’m not going to reread or proof this so I’ll stop in just a second. I just wish for you to understand that we are still in our infancy here. Nothing has really matured yet. Do google, flickr, youtube, del.ic.ous and hundreds of other similar names seem like mature companies? Careful here, remember, information doesn’t factor your stock price against maturity. Information doesn’t care what your popularity is or how you dress. Information in this context only cares about being free.
The freedom of information is still around the corner and the true benefits of the internet are just coming into view. The semantic web and web 3.0 are signs of hope and renewed opportunity. They will re-level the playing field again in a shorter amount of time. If you feel like you’re behind, that state of mind could cost you time and money on today’s web. Sure the pace is picking up speed but so is our ability to learn, harness and apply new knowledge and techniques for setting information free.
Where you are on today’s playing field is largely related to your ability to bring fresh ideas to the mix. Companies, websites and business models are being flushed out in weeks rather than months and fortunes are beginning to be measured in units of time as much as dollars.
As Ghandi said, “be the change you wish to see in the world” and think about ways you can develop a sustainable design for your perfect life by harnessing the disruptive nature caused by setting information free.
We all come from the same root and developing a sustainable attitube (he he a pun) will go along way in helping you design your life here.
P.S. Don’t forget the aloha!
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