Management Information Systems, 13TH ED.
MANAGING THE DIGITAL FIRM
Kenneth C. Laudon ● Jane P. Laudon
continued
Learning Track 5: Introduction to Web 2.0
Many of the unique features of e-commerce and the Internet come together in
a set of applications and social media technologies referred to as Web 2.0. e
Internet started out as a simple network to support e-mail and file transfers
among remote computers. Communication among experts was the purpose.
e Web started out as a way to use the Internet to display simple pages and
allow the user to navigate among the pages by linking them together elec–
Let’s take a quick look at some examples of Web 2.0 applications and sites:
◆ Twitter is a social network/micro-blogging service that encourages users
to enter 140-character messages (“tweets”) in answer to the question
“What are you doing?” Twitter has more than 140 million active users
◆ YouTube, owned by Google after a $1.65 billion purchase, is the world’s
largest online consumer-generated video-posting site. In 2012, YouTube
users to create, edit, and
distribute content; share
preferences, bookmarks,
and online personas;
participate in virtual lives;
and build online
Chapter 7: Telecommunications, the Internet, and Wireless Technology
Chapter 7 Learning Track 5 2
continued
◆ e Apple iPhone (with more than 244 million sold worldwide through
June 2012) supports mobile versions of Web 2.0 applications such as
WordPress for the iPhone (which enables users to write posts, post photos,
and manage comments to their blog via an iPhone or iPod touch), Mint
◆ Instagram is a mobile photo-sharing application available for Androids
and iPhones that allows users to easily apply a variety of different photo
filters and borders, and then post the photos to social networks such as
◆ Wikipedia allows contributors around the world to share their knowl-
edge and in the process has become the most successful online encyclo-
pedia, far surpassing “professional” encyclopedias such as Encarta and
Britannica. Wikipedia is one of the largest collaboratively edited refer–
◆ StumbleUpon helps users discover and rate online content targeted to
Chapter 7 Learning Track 5 3
◆ Tumblr is a combination of blog platform and social network. It allows
users to easily post text, photos, links, music, videos and more. As of
June 2012, Tumblr hosts almost 60 million blogs, containing almost 25
billion posts. On a typical day, users make over 65 million posts (Tumblr.
What do all these Web 2.0 applications and sites have in common? First, they
rely on user– and consumer-generated content. ese are all “applications”
created by people, especially people in the 18–34 year-old demographic, and
in the 7–17 age group as well. “Regular” people (not just experts or profession–
als) are creating, sharing, modifying, and broadcasting content to huge audi-
ences. Second, easy search capability is a key to their success. ird, they are
Chapter 7 Learning Track 5 4