Web 2.0 differs from its predecessor in its collaborative and user-centered design. This is what Professor Michael Wesch is alluding to in his popular video, “The Machine is Us(ing) Us”. He suggests that the content of the World Wide Web is created and used by its own users, whose behavior and ideas teach and enhance the “Machine”. With this new system form and content can now function independently from each other. The resulting simplification of the data import and export process has broadened the accessibility of World Wide Web. Now, just about anyone with a computer and an internet connection can read, write, and publish their ideas through various forms social media. As users of the Web, we have transformed from passive viewers to active producers and consumers in a virtual community.
For some however, the ease and accessibility of user-generated content is also its bane. Because the content is open to the mass public, some question its credibility. While skeptics doubt the authenticity of collaborative information web sites like Wikipedia, others have found them to be an enriching and helpful learning tool. In recent years, it seems as though sites like Wikipedia are gradually shedding their academic stigma. While citing Wikipedia is still forbidden in most classrooms, it now possesses enough credibility for general use. On a similar note, one can now maintain their social life within the confines of his or her own room using different social media networking websites. In the past this scenario would have been an oxymoron, but today it seems to indicate an ongoing shift in how we view human interaction and evaluate credibility.
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