This is unrelated, but does anyone know what Web 2.0 is and if/how it relates to web development?

Participatory Web 2.0 for development in short Web2forDev is a way of employing web services, in order to improve information sharing and collaborative production of content in the context of development work. In this context actors in development can easily relate to other stakeholders, have selective access to information, produce and publish their own content and redistribute pieces of content released by others. They can integrate, combine, aggregate, generate, moderate and mediate content. In a typical Web2forDev scenario data and/or functionalities from a number of free/low cost online applications are combined and served as mashups thus ensuring a wide range of online services at low cost.

Hi Deanna. I most often run across people using "web 2.0" as shorthand for emphasizing user participation and collaboration and user 'ownership' on web platforms; including development of open source software as well as engagement drivers like user-generated content, social media conversations, commenting, opinion polls, "voting", giving products star ratings and reviews, "Likes", sharing, content personalization (via website or browser plug-ins,), gamification, etc. But it historically means more. As O'Reilly puts it: Web 2.0 doesn't have a hard boundaries, but rather, a gravitational core.

You may find this link interesting: it goes back to the birth of the 'next-generation' web and the term "web 2.0" in the wake of the dot.com bust. http://www.oreilly.com/pub/a/web2/archive/what-is-web-20.html

Regarding gamifcation in particular, I highly recommend "Gamification" by Gartner analyst Brian Burke. It's concise, insightful, and succinct. http://amzn.to/1uQcVlb

(Note: the user "E A"'s comment above is a cut and paste from Wikipedia's definition of "Web 2.0 for development": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_2.0_for_development )

Hi Sherrie and E A,

Thank you! This has been most helpful.

You're welcome!

You are welcome!