MappingTheWeb //

I’m hoping web 3.0 goes back to the basics, although I’m not convinced that will be the case. Let me also backtrack and re-iterate that I hate buzzwords, so excuse my use of the terms web 3.0 and web 1.0. I am simply referring to the coming of the new-web. Wow, even that sounds wishy-washy…

Simply put, I am hoping that the next big step for the web is actually two steps backward. My aspiration is that we return to the original vision of Tim Berners-Lee of a semantic web, full of wonderful things such as directories and meaningful links. Sounds boring and lame, but it’s a lot more useful and relevant. The Internet, as we know it now, is riddled with interactivity, video, Flash, AJAX, and many other features. Now don’t get me wrong - these can all be useful, relevant, and sometimes entertaining, but in many cases they simply add clutter and confuse the user experience.

The world of search engine optimization (SEO), in essence, attempts to convert ambiguous, equivocal web pages to relevant, content-rich websites. By altering title tags, META tags, URL structure, headers, linking structure, and content, one is not only optimizing for search engines, but also creating a more usable, people-friendly site. Yes, this is what the web was meant to be.

I can’t say enough good things about sites that attempt to simplify the experience and provide a very focused, clean-cut offering. I’m referring to sites such as Craigslist, Wikipedia, and del.icio.us. Their interfaces aren’t cluttered or crammed with images. Pages are legible and usability is tremendous. Add to that such things as clean URLs and a innate linking structure, and we are talking about a whole new type of experience - or an old one that we forgot about.