On 9 January
2005, I published the first of my Web 2.0 Weekly
Wrap-ups. When I launched it I described it as “a weekly summary of news and views
relating to Web 2.0 (Web as platform).” I pumped out one a week for the rest of 2005. In
many ways I viewed the Wrap-Up as the anchor for my blog.
Currently the Weekly Wrap-Up is on a
break – as I enjoy the New Zealand summer weather, mow the lawns, quaff coronas,
spend quality time, do maintenance on R/WW’s design, strategize for 2006 and watch the
cricket. So this is a good opportunity to look back at the highlights of the Weekly
Wrap-Up in 2005. I’m not sure what form it will take in ’06, but it served me well in
’05.
Here’s a list of one highlight chosen from each Weekly Wrap-Up throughout the year. In
a way it tells the story of the whole Web 2.0 meme, as it rolled out and eventually drove
some of us to distraction. Time Magazine better hurry up and put Web 2.0 on their cover…
2-8 January
2005: Six Apart acquires LiveJournal
9-15 January:
Feedburner releases statistics for RSS Aggregator market share
16-22 January:
Lawyer Martin Schwimmer opened up a can of worms with his request (granted) to have his
RSS feed removed from Bloglines.
30 Jan-6 Feb: a
sensationalistic headlines special. Top story: Bloglines Shocker! Butler Buys Master of
the Blog Universe!
7-13 Feb:
43Things gets both positive and negative publicity from Salon.com in the space of 24
hours.
14-20 Feb: NY
Times Buys About.com.
21-27 Feb: an
Oscars special. Best New Web App Approach That Isn’t Really New = AJAX!
28 Feb – 6 Mar:
“If Web 2.0 was a school classroom, then Yahoo would be the teacher’s pet right
now.”
7-13 Mar:
Microsoft’s Start.com
21-27 Mar:
“So… what was new at Yahoo this week?”
28 Mar – 3 Apr:
del.icio.us gets funding
4-10 Apr:
“Advertising within an RSS feed is a sensitive issue and it’s a case of softly softly for
publishers, but I do think we’re turning a corner.”
11-17 Apr:
Rupert Murdoch’s Sermon From The Mount
18-24 Apr:
Mobile Web 2.Woe
25 Apr – 1 May:
“This week Google released two major updates to their online advertising services, which
account for 97% of Google’s revenue.”
2-8 May: Sirius
Satellite Radio Inc. launching a podcasting show, to be hosted by ex-MTV star Adam
Curry.
9-15 May:
Greasemonkey gives power to power users
16-22 May:
Google factory Tour: “New? Google Personalized Homepage, Google Earth (a satellite
mapping service), AdSense for Feeds, language translations.”
23-29 May:
Techie Post of the Week: chmod 777 web
30 May – 5
June: RSS Ripoff Merchants
6-12 June:
Introducing… New apps on the block
13-19 June:
International Special
20-26 June:
“The biggest story of the week, probably even the year, was Microsoft’s bearhug embrace
of RSS.”
27 June – 3
July: Thoughts on Yahoo! My Web 2.0
4-10 July:
London bombings
11-17 July: RSS
Growing Up So Fast
18-24 July:
News Corp bought MySpace – implications
25-31 July:
Ajax Backlash
1-7 August:
Hype 2.0
8-14 August: “A
lot of interest this week in how the label ‘RSS’ is being usurped by ‘feeds’ or ‘Web
feeds’.”
15-21 August:
Flock and WordPress.com released.
22-28 August:
Google releases Google Talk.
29 Aug – 4 Sep:
Social tools help in Katrina Hurricane
5-11 Sep: “News
this week that Microsoft is releasing a set of developer APIs for four MSN properties:
MSN Virtual Earth, MSN Messenger, Start.com and MSN Search.”
12-18 Sep: eBay
confirmed its acquisition of Skype for between $2.6 – 4.1 billion.
19-25 Sep:
“This week saw a big increase in blog posts about Web 2.0, probably because of the
upcoming Web 2.0 conference.”
26 Sep – 2 Oct:
“A lot of online trees were felled this week to write about what Web 2.0 means.”
3-9 October:
Web 2.0 Conference Special
10-16 Oct:
Susan Mernit quote: “The Valley is humming with activity and with what some say is
acquisition fever, but is often the happy sounds of geeks being creative.”
17-23 Oct:
“This was the week when the Web 2.0 Naysayers reached a crescendo of cynicism and even
bile.”
24-30 Oct: Big
3 news…
31 Oct – 6 Nov:
Microsoft Live wrap-up
7 – 13 Nov:
“There’s something about the Web 2.0 meme that drives people into either passionate,
sometimes bubble-icious behavior – or enrages them into cyncial, often foul-mouthed
rants. There’s not much middle ground.”
14-20 Nov:
Google Base – the good, the bad and the ugly
26 Nov – 2 Dec:
Yahoo integrates RSS into Yahoo! Mail and their alerts service.
3 – 9 Dec: Open
up your media, the Lightnet revolution is here.
10 – 16 Dec:
Yahoo buys del.icio.us
